


Here it Goes Again

by BossToaster (ChaoticReactions)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Atlas bond, De-Aged Shiro (Voltron), Fluff and Angst, Gen, Humor, Shiro Week 2018, Team as Family, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-20
Updated: 2018-11-22
Packaged: 2019-08-25 21:57:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 33,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16669063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChaoticReactions/pseuds/BossToaster
Summary: Shiro wakes up in a hospital.  This should be normal by now, except that he doesn't remember the times before.  Because he's ten years old again.It turns out, in the future he's a cool Captain with a floating metal arm and a spaceship that talks to him.Shiro canworkwith this.Written for Shiro Week 2018





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A quick thank you to Xyriath and Amorremanet for letting me use their backstory for Iverson. Their version of him is wonderful so this is my tiny tribute.

Shiro's bed was wrong.

Even before he really woke up, Shiro knew that.  These sheets were thinner, with a rough texture he associated with hotel beds.  Like the sheets had been washed and folded so many times that they never felt lived in.  They smelled recently washed, with a hint of antibiotics. His pillow was wrong too, thin and rough.  There was only one, rather than the two big ones in his own bed. Shiro always woke up with one tucked under his arm, no matter where they were when he fell asleep.

This wasn't his bed.  And it wasn't a hotel bed, either.  Shiro knew this scent.

He was in a hospital.

His fingers curled into the rough sheets as he struggled to orient himself.  How had he gotten here? Last he remembered was just a normal day. He didn't hurt, either.  The other times he'd been in the hospital, either he'd been there for someone else, or he'd known right away he was hurt.  Nothing felt-

Wait.

Shiro clenched his hand again, this time just the right.

It reacted, but it felt different.  Less resistant. As if he was just thinking about moving his hand rather than actually using his muscles.  But he still felt the sheet pull under his head, taut with the pressure.

Officially confused, Shiro cracked open his eyes.

And saw a metal hand where his normal one should be.

Shiro's eyes went wide with alarm and confusion.

"-have no record of such a sustained change," someone said.  Her accent was English, not the American drawl that Shiro was just finally getting used to.  "The ability to alter a body like this is usually not so... natural. It must be powered by quintessence."

Another person snorted loudly.  "And he shouldn't be that way. This isn't time travel.  If it was, he wouldn't look like that. The hair and the arm would have changed to match how he looked then."  This woman sounded younger than the other. 

"Yeah, the scar too."  A man this time, sounding very distinctly nervous.  "Whatever's wrong with Atlas has to have caused this.  I don't know how, but Atlas is already..." He trailed off.

"Weird as hell?" Another man offered.

Shiro gasped before he could help himself.

All the voices stopped suddenly.  Shiro could feel the burn of many eyes on him.  He considered pretending to still be asleep, but it was probably too late for that.  So instead he slowly pushed himself up off his stomach, then turned around to face all the voices.

A room full of strangers peered down at Shiro.

Shiro curled in on himself, watching them all warily.  His hands twisted in his lap, pulling on the thin blanket.  The metal one was bigger and thicker than the other, and it floated along rather than connected to his shoulder like it should.  But otherwise they were perfectly normal hands - his hands.

The hands of a boy.

Frowning, Shiro held out the weird right arm in front of him.  It bobbed a bit in the air, but it didn't weigh anything, at least not to Shiro.  He wiggled all the fingers, then turned it over so the palm was face up.

It was his arm.  He controlled it just like he would the right arm he'd gone to sleep with.  It was just robotic and it flew.

That was weird.  It was terrifying.  His arm was gone and replaced with this future thing.

But Shiro couldn't manage any kind of alarm.  This was his arm. He knew it like he knew his name was Takashi Shirogane, that he was ten years old, and that he wanted to fly when he grew up.  Those were things that had been true for as long as he could remember, even though this arm hadn't been here yesterday.

So instead he grinned and waved the robot arm.  "Cool."

All of the adults audibly let out a breath of air.  Shiro looked up at them, still wary, but they all seemed relieved.  Like there had been some kind of test, and he'd passed.

Well, good.  Shiro did great on tests.  Enough that his new teachers in the United States wanted him to go up a grade, even though his grandfather didn't seem to like the idea.

Speaking of...

Shiro frowned around the room, but he just saw more beds like he was in, and one more adult woman clacking around in heels and wearing lab coat.  She was making a rapid beeline toward Shiro. If this was a really weird hospital, then she was probably a doctor. At least, he hoped so. None of the other adults looked like they'd be very good doctors.  Only one of them looked old enough to be a real doctor, and he had bright orange hair and a thick mustache. Shiro had never seen a doctor with dyed hair before.

None of these people were his grandfather, either.

"Hello, Captain Shirogane," the probably-a-doctor-woman said, her voice crisp and professional.  Immediately, Shiro straightened under the tone. She was talking to him like a grown-up, and he wanted to prove her right.  After all, he was ten now. Everyone knew that hitting double digits made you practically grown. "How are you feeling?"

Wait.

Captain?

"I'm okay," he said.  Under her steady gaze, his fingers started to pluck at the blanket again.  "Nothing hurts. What happened?"

"We're trying to figure that out right now," the doctor said.  She pulled over a chair and sat down next to him, ignoring the whole crowd with the air of someone who had better things to deal with.  "I think you can help us with that. Do you mind answering a couple of questions for me?"

"Can I ask questions too?"

The doctor's lips quirked up, just barely breaking her professional expression.  Immediately, Shiro relaxed more. If she was smiling like that, she probably liked him, and she was probably nice.    "Of course. Can I go first?"

Well, Shiro was pretty sure his question was more pressing.  But she had asked first, and that was only fair. So he gave a tiny little nod.

"I have two questions," she said.  "They're related. What was the last thing that happened before you woke up just now?  Do you know who I am?"

...Was he supposed to?  Shiro squinted at the woman, looking her up and down.  She was short for a grown-up, not that much taller than him when sitting.  Her brown hair was cut short, and she had an aura of someone who you'd listen to whether you liked it or not.

"I went to school, I think," Shiro said slowly.  Thinking back, he had a lot of vague memories of going to school and taking tests and being worried his English was good enough or if he was going to get teased.  He was in the last year of elementary school, so lots of the other students had known each other for years now, while Shiro had just started a couple of months ago.  But it all kind of melted together. He couldn't have said what he had for dinner, or what he learned in school yesterday, or if Grandfather had said goodnight to him.

Discomfort started to bubble up in Shiro.  His stomach flipped until he was afraid he was going to be sick, and he looked around one more time as if he could have missed his grandfather.  No such luck.

But the doctor was still waiting, and all the other grown-ups were watching him too.  They'd all been testing him before, so many this was a test too. So he had to answer right.  "I went to school," he repeated, more confident than he felt. "And then I went home, and I had dinner, and I did my homework.  And I went to bed." Not when he was supposed to, maybe. But only a couple hours late. Grandfather hadn't found his latest stashed book yet.

Had he?  Shiro couldn't remember what the last one was.  He'd been working through the Callum Astro series, but he couldn't quite recall which one he'd been on.  Was it the one where he searched for Martians? The one where he visited the Jupiter colonies? The one where he flew through the asteroid belt?

Shiro had just been reading it yesterday!  He should remember.

Apparently he should also remember the doctor lady, too.  But he eyed her one more time before he shook his head. "I don't know you.  Should I?"

"There's no wrong answer," the doctor said, which was a lie adults used when you were wrong and wanted to be nice about it.  "My name is Doctor Fraiser. You had a bit of an accident, but we're going to make sure you're okay. Now, you had questions too?"

Shiro frowned at her, then at the rest of the crowd.  They were all still in a lump, watching him with uncanny intensity.  Was he supposed to know them too?

Drawing himself up, Shiro held his chin high and met Dr. Fraiser's gaze full on.  "Why am I forgetting stuff?" He demanded, as steadily as he could manage. There was only a hint of a wobble to his voice.  "Why is my arm different? And where's Grandfather?"

Even as he asked, Shiro's stomach sank.  If Grandfather was okay, wouldn't he be here with Shiro?  There was an obvious answer, and it throbbed uncomfortably in his stomach.  But it felt old, too. Mixed up in the past, like his Callum Astro books and his school lessons.

"Oh, boy," one of the guys squeaked out.  Looking over, Shiro saw now it was the broad man with the headband who had sounded nervous before.

Dr. Fraiser finally looked over at the others, her brows both up.  "As far as my testing goes, he's almost exactly as he should be at this age."  The word 'almost' was emphasized just slightly, as if hoping he wouldn't notice the hint.  "The rest of these questions are probably up to you."

The English woman from before cleared her throat.  She had huge white hair flowing down her back and colored markings on her checks.  Her dark, pointed ears stuck out past the fluffy mass of hair. It was like she was a weird elf from some of Shiro's fantasy books.  "Perhaps we should discuss this outside?" She nodded pointedly to him.

Immediately, Shiro shot up, affronted.  "Why? I'm the one in the hospital! I should know what's wrong with me!  Where's Grandfather?" They couldn't keep him away. That was kidnapping, and Shiro was going to scream and call the police on them.

"Woah, woah," one of the men said.  This one was lanky, and he plastered a big grin on his face like that could reassure Shiro.  "I got this. Shiro, buddy. No need to worry! It's not that. It's just that some of this stuff is secret.  Top Secret." The capital letters were audible. "So some of it you can't hear, that's all. It's government stuff, sorry."

With that, Smiley-guy spread his arms wide and shrugged, as if that solved everything.

Shiro stared at him, then crossed his arms.  "You're lying."

"No, I'm not!"

"Yes, you are!  You're a liar! Why are you lying about my grandfather?"  The more they dodged the question, the sicker Shiro felt. Why wouldn't they just show him?  Why wasn't Grandfather sticking his head out through the door and giving him that familiar, warm smile?

The smaller woman snorted and pushed her glasses up on her nose.  "Good job. You got this."

"Bite me, Pidge."

Orange-hair stepped forward as well.  Now that Shiro was looking, he had the weird face markings and pointy ears too.  He sat down at the foot of Shiro's bed, putting himself closer to his height. "How about we talk a little first, hm?  I know you're very confused indeed, but so are we, I'm afraid. We don't really know what happened, and we're trying to figure it out.  But we need your help for that. We'll explain more, I promise, but I think we all need to stay calm." Then he held out his hand, shoulders back and prideful.  "My name is Coran Hieronymus Wimbleton Smythe."

Slowly, Shiro reached out and shook the man's hand.  His was tiny in comparison, nearly engulfed. "I'm Shiro.  But you already know me, don't you?"

Coran looked back at the white haired elf, who started to shake her head, then sighed.  Focusing again, he nodded. "We do. You seem to be having some memory problems. We want to tell you more, but there's a lot of information that's going to be very difficult to explain.  We just want to figure out how best to tell you so that you don't get confused. There may be some things we keep private, but only because we don't fully understand ourselves."

It was novel to have an adult admit they couldn't explain something because they didn't know.  Shiro stared up at Coran in awe, then slowly nodded. "Okay. But you still haven't told me where my Grandfather is."

"Well, I don't personally know," Coran admitted.  He turned and looked at the only person who hadn't spoken yet.  He had dark hair and a scar over his cheeks, and his arms were crossed tightly in front of his chest.  "Keith? Can you answer this one?"

Keith pressed his lips thin, but he nodded.  "I can. But — Look, I'm not lying to him. He deserves to know.  There's nothing worse than adults keeping things from you and pretending it's for your own good, and not that they don't want to have to deal with the reaction."

The elf woman flinched, then drew herself up.  "Excuse me?"

"Not —"  Keith sighed.  "I get the impulse.  But trust me, okay? It's worse.  I wish my Dad had just told me stuff instead of protecting me from it, you know?  Don't you?"

This time, the woman shifted on her feet.  "There are some things that children aren't ready for."

"If he was a little kid, I'd agree with you.  But he's old enough to see through pandering."  His eyes flickered to smiley-guy, who huffed. Then Keith moved over and sat down on the other side of Coran.  

Shiro watched, his stomach churning again.  Something big and weird and bad had happened.  But at least one person wanted to be honest about it.  Shiro swallowed hard and watched Keith warily. Somehow, he already knew the words, but he still hoped he was jumping to conclusions.

"Hey, Shiro," Keith said.  He met his eyes directly, just like Dr. Fraiser had.  "The thing is, it's been a long longer since you went to bed than it feels like.  Your grandfather isn't around anymore."

There it was.

Shiro's throat closed up.  He blinked rapidly, but he could still feel the prickle of tears.  He'd known. Just like he knew the arm was normal.

When he didn't reply, Keith moved closer and put a gentle hand on Shiro's shoulder.  He paused, like he was confused at how much bigger he was, then sighed. "I'm sorry."

Sniffling, Shiro nodded.  He grabbed for the pillow and put it over his face, so that no one could see him tear up.  He just barely managed to stop the flow before they fully fell, teetering on the knife's edge of a sob.  For another couple of minutes, he just pushed his head into the pillow, as if not looking would make his world go back to normal.  Then he'd have his real arm and his grandfather and he'd remember his latest book.

But that didn't happen.  The warm hand on his shoulder didn't move at all, remaining a big, heavy anchor to his current reality.

"What happened?" Shiro finally asked.  "Did he get hurt?" He dropped the pillow to look over all the adults.

Everyone was looking at Keith, who looked distinctly uncomfortable.  "I don't know for sure," he said finally. "It was a while ago for us.  Someone else might know."

"Would Dad?" The short woman asked.  "Or maybe Iverson would know."

"What do you mean it's been a while?" Shiro asked, before anyone else could offer suggestions.  He finally pushed off Keith's hand, ignoring that it made the man flinch. That felt bad, but not as bad as knowing his grandfather was definitely dead.  "I saw him yesterday!" At least, he thought he had.

The small woman sighed.  "Actually, it's been a few years."  She stepped forward, eyes flickering over him from head to toe, like she was trying to figure him out.  Which was unfair, since they all apparently knew stuff about him, but he knew nothing about them. "Because until five hours ago, you were twenty six years old."

Shiro stared.

The grown ups all stared back, clearly waiting for his reaction.

Finally, Shiro slowly lifted one hand and pointed to his face.  "I'm ten," he said, like he'd explain to a really little kid, or someone who was stupid.

Smiley-guy choked out a surprised laugh, but no less than three glares made him stop.

"Yeah, well, that's the part that we can't explain."  She crossed her arms and sighed. "You were working with a piece of technology we don't really understand well, and there was a discharge.  Then you looked like this. We were hoping it was just a physical change, but clearly not."

This was-

This was the dumbest thing Shiro had ever heard.

"Prove it," Shiro finally said.  He pushed himself against the head of the bed and scowled at them all, bristled like a cornered animal.  "Prove any of this... this bullshit."

Part of Shiro flinched at the curse, waiting for his grandfather to snap out  _ 'Takashi,' _ even from all the way across their home.  But his grandfather was dead, dead for years and years, so he could say whatever he wanted to.

This time, the small woman looked off-balance.  "Um. I could show you the readings?"

"No, prove you know me.  You know my name, but anyone can find that out.  If you really know me, then say something only my friends would know."  Shiro lifted his chin in challenge, heart pounding from both the audacity of yelling at a group of adults and the churning emotions inside him.

"Um, well..."  Smiley paused, then frowned.  "I mean, we've only known you recently, except Keith.  None of us knew you this young. So that's harder."

Shiro stared back, not backing down at all.

"You're a pilot," Headband-guy offered, perking up.  "You're really good at it, too. Youngest to ever command an off-world mission."

For a moment, the dark, heavy feeling in Shiro's chest lightened.  He did that? He went to space? He was a commander?

But then his smile fell, and he ducked his head.  "Can you prove that?"

"Well, not right now," Headband admitted.  "If I had some time? Or a tablet or something.  There's probably articles or whatever. Keith, do you know if Shiro keeps any mementos of that somewhere?"

Keith considered.  "I don't know. I think he did once, but then after Kerberos, he put a lot of his stuff in storage.  Then, you know, everything happened." At Shiro's narrow look, he sighed. "I'll explain later, okay?  As much as I can But let's prove this to you first."

The lady elf frowned at Shiro, like she was seeing him for the first time.  "Well, I made the arm you wear now. But I suppose I can't prove that either.  It never occurred to me how... private you are. I don't believe I know anything about your childhood.  You never spoke of family back home." Her shoulders slumped, looking honestly hurt. "It didn't even occur to me to ask.  He's always been so friendly during conversations and when anyone shares something with him. I completely missed that he didn't share in return."

Small woman picked a tablet off the table and tapped on it.  "I'm getting Dad. He's known Shiro for the longest of anyone."

"Keith as well," Coran said, inclining his head at him.

Keith's face scrunched up.  "I know some things. Shiro's private, yeah.  And I don't know exactly what he knew at ten, either."  He looked over everyone in the room. "Maybe this would be better alone?"

Immediately, Shiro went stuff.  "No!" Keith was okay, but he wasn't going to be alone with some strange adult.  He knew better than that. They had assemblies and watched videos about kids who were alone with weird adults and were kidnapped and never seen again.  Even if they were all working together, Shiro still didn't like being alone with them. "I don't want more sneaking around or any of that. Just prove you know me!"

Closing his eyes, Keith let out a long sigh.  "Alright, but just remember that you said that."  He took a deep breath, then met Shiro's eyes dead on.  "You've wanted to fly for as long as you can remember. When you were young — I'm guessing younger than now — you even wanted to fly hot air balloons.  You live with your grandfather because your mother got sick a few years ago. Living in the States gives you access to schools that let you fast track, but your grandfather still made you wait out the first year with kids your age.  You love fantasy movies. One time you dressed up as Aragorn for Halloween, but that was at the Garrison. You're sick, and you have to do special exercises to make sure your arms don't hurt."

Oh.

Immediately, Shiro clutched his right wrist with his left hand.  Once in a while, they ached weirdly, just like when he'd had his big growth spurt last year and all of him hurt.  He hadn't told any of the kids at school about that, yet. Before they knew what was wrong, he'd get clumsy and he got teased for that, so he never wanted anyone to know.

Keith knew him.

This was real.

"Maybe this is enough excitement for now," Dr. Fraiser said.  She got out of the chair to hover next to Shiro's shoulder. "Captain Shirogane was exposed to a lot of energy just a few hours ago, enough to leave him unconscious for several hours.  I know we all want to fix this, but a break would be good. He should eat at the very least."

Headband perked at that.  "Oh! Yeah." He smiled at Shiro, though it was a little strained.  "I can make you mac and cheese if you want."

The words only barely stirred interest in Shiro.  He looked over and gave a slow nod. Knowing his favorite food was just more proof, but he was also a little hungry.  "From the box?" He finally asked.

"No, I —"  Hunk paused, then groaned.  "Of course that's what you want.  Yeah, I can try. I think there's some boxes in your kitchen."  He grumbled something that sounded distinctly uncomplimentary.

Dr. Fraiser frowned, but one pleading look at Shiro kept her from objecting.  "That settles that. All of you, shoo. I'm sure you have plenty to be working on.  Go ahead and send me whatever useful you find."

"Will do," the small woman promised. "Atlas' monitoring system caught all of it, so we have recordings of the energy. Hopefully we'll have the situation fixed." She managed a surprisingly warm smile at Shiro. "We'll catch you up pretty quick."

The elf woman's eyes went wide and she smacked one hand over her mouth. "Oh! Atlas?"

"What about it?" Smiley asked.

"Shiro still has the arm. Which means he still has the crystal."

Coran stood slowly and peered down at Shiro, though he was wise enough not to reach for it. "So he does. Would he still be bonded? He doesn't have the experience or... emotional connection he would as an adult."

Elf woman considered, then folded her hands in front of her. "I'm sorry to keep you from resting, but we need one quick test. If you could please close your eyes and concentrate on anything odd you feel, that would be very helpful."

Shiro wasn't in a particularly helpful mood. But she was being polite and she kind of looked and sounded like Galadriel, so he was willing to give her this.  Closing his eyes, he concentrated inward, like he was looking for any subtle pains.

Something in the back of Shiro's mind shifted.

He went still, alarmed.  Things were not supposed to move in his head without him thinking them.  That was how it worked.

Now that he was paying attention to it, the feeling surged.  It was like trying to hold a very excited dog who wouldn't stop squirming and trying to lick his face.   _ Captain!   _

....Had his brain just talked to him?

The presence squirmed again, no less excited for his confusion.  _  I am Atlas.  You were quiet and hurt.  I am sorry, I did not mean to hurt you. _

Atlas?  That was the thing everyone was talking about.  That had hurt him? 

_ My heart had too much energy stored inside, _ Atlas explained.  There was a flash of a room, with a podium in the middle.  Inside was a glass case, with a crystal the size of his fist floating inside.   _ When you touched it, the energy went to you.  I did not want to hurt you. I never want to hurt you.  I love you, Captain. _

...What, now?

The words should have been weird and alarming, but Shiro could feel exactly what Atlas did.  This voice was apologetic and sincere. They — she — loved him, and whatever had happened to him was an accident.  It was impossible to fear anyone who cared for him so dearly.

It was all confusing, but that was just Shiro's life right now.  Nothing made sense, so this might as well have happened. It matched what the adults had said, anyway.

But why did Atlas call him Captain?  Why did the doctor call him Captain, too?

_ Because you are Captain. _

Shiro suddenly saw.  He understood. Atlas wasn't a person or a ghost or anything like that.  He saw the full picture of her, huge and beautiful and his.

"This is a _ spaceship!" _

***

Shiro trotted through the hallway, half a step in front of Sam Holt despite his much shorter legs. His head swiveled around, absolutely entranced. Atlas looked just like all his fantasies of being on a spaceship, even more so than the actual documentaries and exhibits he'd gone to see. The walls where shining chrome, illuminated by blue lines running the length of the ceiling and along the floor. The color reflected off the walls, casting everything in blue as if it was all glowing very faintly.

It was like Star Trek, but even cooler.

And  _ his. _

Also cool was the new uniform he was wearing. It was a real life military uniform, made just for him. At first, he was confused why the Atlas had a suit for someone his size, especially since it lacked a sleeve where the weird robot arm went. But Commander Holt said that Atlas could just make them, like a replicator on the Enterprise. It looked like the ones that Keith and all of them wore - mostly white, with blocks of color on the shoulders and arms. Unlike everyone else's, Shiro's wasn't the orange of most of the crew, or the various bright colors that the other adults wore. His was crisp, stately black.

Because he was the Captain.

"Are we heading anywhere in particular?" Holt asked, amused. He was apparently content to follow along during Shiro's mini-tour. "If you like, I can show you to the rec room."

Shiro shook his head, not even looking back. "You don't need to. I know where everything is."

There was a long silence from Holt. "Ah," he finally said. "Then where are we going?"

"I just want to see something." Shiro turned around a corner, so abruptly that Holt and to turn on his heel to follow. One more turn to the right, and a door opened up in front of them.

Holt's steps slowed. "Shiro?" He called, a warning note to his voice. "I'm not sure-"

Without so much as a glance, Shiro bolted in before he could be told to stop.

The room was almost completely empty, except for a pedestal with a glass case, and a crystal floating in the center.

Just like the vision he'd gotten from Atlas.

This was her heart.

_ Not like yours, _ Atlas added, as if that needed clarifying.  _ This supplies me with power and makes me able to speak with you. Without it, I am a ship like the jets in my bay. With it, I am able to change and grow. _

So, not really like a heart at all. More like a soul.

There was an impression of a shrug from Atlas. Whatever term Shiro wanted was fine. It was all metaphor anyway.

Shiro stepped closer to the shining crystal, awed by the light.

"Shiro!" A hand wrapped around his waist and physically pulled him back. Holt managed to hold him firmly, even when he started to flail and struggle. "You have to stay back from that!"

"Why?" Shiro asked, kicking in the air. "It's Atlas. I'm her Captain, and she said I could come see."  He shouldn't have liked this stranger picking him up, but he wasn't. Holt was familiar. In the same way his arm was normal, so was this man, and all the other weird adults Shiro had met so far.

Huffing, Holt put Shiro down. Then he kneeled down in front of him, very serious and stern. "You can look if you want, but I want you to stay away from it, okay? We still don't know what happened here or why."

Shiro slumped sulkily under the disapproving stare. Commander Holt kept his tone even, not snapping. That would have at least let Shiro get mad about it. "Atlas won't hurt me," he said earnestly.  It was true. He could feel it. Atlas would never.

"Atlas wouldn't want to hurt you," Holt agreed, still steady. "But accidents happen, just like they did this morning."

Shiro's bottom lip stuck out as he strained to see around Holt. "I'm fine!  See? I don't hurt at all, and Dr. Fraiser said nothing's wrong. Why can't I look?  It's cool."

In his head, Atlas preened happily.

"Maybe it doesn't hurt, but it did change you." Holt finally let go, but he continued to regard Shiro gravely. "It aged you back sixteen years. What happens if it happens again?"

Shiro shrugged. "I get younger again. That's not a big deal." He didn't want it, but it'd be fine. No need for all this drama.

"And what happens if you deage sixteen years again?"

This time, Shiro paused. "I'm only ten," he pointed out.

Holt raised one eyebrow and waited.

If it happened again, then Shiro would be pushed back six years before he was even born. The blood drained from Shiro's face as he gaped up at Holt. "I don't want to be unmade! Could you fix it?"

"I certainly hope so. But how about we make it easier and just not touch Atlas' crystal again, okay?"

This time, Shiro bobbed his head up and down, heart still pounding. Could Atlas really do that? Undo him completely?

There was a delay from Atlas, as if she was deciding how to answer that.  _ I would not ever try to. I will keep you safe, I promise. _

But that didn't mean it couldn't happen by accident. Shiro shivered and ducked his head. "Okay. I'm ready to go now."

"Smart boy," Holt said. He put a big, comforting hand on Shiro's back and gently lead him out. "You're very safe outside of that room, though. Everyone here is tasked with keeping you safe, you know."

"Because I'm the Captain?"

Holt's lips thinned. "Partly, yes, I suppose. But also because they care about you. You're very friendly with them."

Staring up at Holt, Shiro's mouth fell open. "Really?" That was so many people!  Atlas was a huge ship, and it had to take an equally large crew to run her. That was like being friends with everyone in his grade. He barely knew the names of everyone in just his own class, much less spent time with all of them.

Shiro had never had that many people looking out for him in particular. Just his family, and that kept getting smaller and smaller. He knew some of the adults and kids in his apartment complex back in Japan, but that had went away when he went to live with his grandfather.

"Of course," Holt said, as if that was perfectly expected. "How about we head to the rec room now? I'm sure the paladins would be happy to come as well."

"The who?"

Holt paused, clearly surprised by the question. It smoothed out quickly and was replaced by a smile. "All the people you met when you woke up. The ones with the uniforms in different colors."

"Oh." Why were they called paladins? That wasn't a military rank. At least, Shiro didn't think it was. Maybe things were different in the future? "Yeah, okay." 

This time, Shiro followed after Holt.  He could have found his way through with Atlas, but his mind wasn't on the task.  Instead, he was still absorbing the new information he'd been given. "Um, Mr Commander?"

Pausing, Holt looked down at him.  His lips quirked like he was hiding a smile.  "You can just call me Sam, Shiro."

Shiro crinkled his nose.  "But you're..." Old. "An adult."

This time, Holt's lips pressed thin like he was angry.  But when his mouth twitched, Shiro realized he was actually holding back laughter.  "It's okay for you to call me Sam anyway. But if you're uncomfortable with that, you can just call me Commander or Holt, okay?"

Well, Commander was pretty cool, because it was all military and important.  Holt was what Shiro had been thinking, but it sounded rude to call an adult that without any kind of title.  Commander Holt was a really long thing to say. Mr Holt was like Mr Spock, but it wasn't on the table, and it was the wrong title anyway.

"Sam," Shiro finally said, though it came out soft and hesitant.  

Ho — Sam nodded warmly, clearly not mad at him for making the choice.  "Good. Now, what did you want to know?"

"What does it mean to be Captain?"

Sam let out a heavy gust of air.  "That's quite a question. It depends a lot on the person and the job, too."

That seemed weird, but Shiro nodded anyway.  "Okay. What does it mean for me?" He picked up his pace so he was even with Sam, looking up seriously at him.

"Well," Sam said, slowly like he was picking out his words.  "For you, I think it means making sure everyone is safe and feels comfortable.  There are plenty of officers who like to keep a professional distance, but for you it's a little different.  We'll all be together for a long time. Months or even years. So I think it's important for you personally that everyone feels like they can talk to you.  You also do you best to make sure everyone is healthy, and they have the supplies they need. But most of all, you want everyone to perform the best they can, so we can help keep the universe be safe of anyone who would try to hurt others."

Shiro's mouth fell open.  He was like that? They were defending the whole universe?  That was so cool! That wasn't even like Star Trek. Sometimes they defended people, but often they were just exploring or learning about places.  And that was really good too, and it was important, but it wasn't like fighting bad guys and making sure everyone in the universe was safe.

Chuckling, Sam put a hand between Shiro's shoulder, gently guiding him so he kept walking.  "You're a very important man in the future. Don't feel like you need to worry about that all just yet.  We're still on Earth for a while. Atlas is getting ready for a long mission, and that takes a few months."

Shiro nodded slowly.   Clearly, Sam was trying to make him feel better, but Shiro wasn't really afraid.  If that was what 26 year old him did, then it was what ten year old him should do.  That wasn't scary, that was awesome. He wanted to blast off into space right now and go punch some mean aliens in the face to save some good aliens.

Closing his eyes, he reached out to the place in his mind where Atlas lived.  Did they really have to wait around? They could be in space right now, right?  What if Atlas just took off? Did Atlas need fuel?

_ I do not need fuel,  _ Atlas said, full of pride.   _ My crystal provides the energy I need, and my connection with you helps me use my other abilities. _

Good!  Then they could just fly out right now-

_ But I do require a crew to function properly, _ Atlas added.  There was reluctance now, like she was afraid of disappointing him.   _ I cannot leave until all that is settled.  It will take a few weeks more, even with your duties being handled. _

Ughhh, that was so long!  Weeks was really months, and that was basically forever.

Atlas gave the mental equivalent of a helpless shrug.

Well, Shiro couldn't blame Atlas for that.  So he opened his eyes and sighed, living with that disappointment.

Instead, he looked up to Sam again.  "Thank you for explaining. But I don't know if it actually answered my question."

Brows up, Sam stopped in front of a double door.  "Oh? What did you want to know, then?"

"If I'm Captain, does that mean I'm in charge of everyone here?"

Sam's eyes widened, and then slammed shut.  He hesitated before he answered, "when you're fully grown?  Yes."

Well, that wasn't a problem.  Ten was practically fully grown.  Shiro nodded. "Okay."

The doors parted, showing a large room, full of comfortable looking furniture.  Most of the floor was covered in various rugs, which looked soft enough that Shiro wanted to take off his shoes.  Several screens floated (!!) in front of chairs and couches, but they were all currently blank. The walls looked like wood.  Shiro started to wonder how they'd done that, until he realized the grains on the beams repeated over and over. It was probably some kind of paper or fake paneling, then. 

Despite how nice the room was, there were very few people around.  One dark-skinned man, bald and with only one eye, sat in one of the easy chairs, a tablet in front of him.  On the couch behind him, two more men sat, talking together. Both were considerably younger than the reading man, and were watching two more adults, these women, play what looked like a game of pool.

At the sound of the door opening, all five heads snapped up to look.

One of the younger men, pale and with floppy brown hair, suddenly snapped to his feet and saluted.  "Sir!"

"Are you serious, Griffin?"  One women said, leaning against the pool table.  Her longer, dark hair was tied back in a messy ponytail, and her glasses shone in Atlas' perpetual blue light.  "He's ten. You don't need to salute him."

"He's still our Captain," Griffin said.  He did drop his arm, but he didn't sit back down.

Shiro stayed silent, watching in awe.  Grown-ups were saluting him, their Captain.  It was a charge like he'd never known. The only thing he'd ever been in charge of before were group projects, but now full fledged soldiers were standing when he entered a room.

It was so cool. 

Sam shook his head, but his lips were curled up in open amusement.  "At ease, Lieutenant. I'm just getting Shiro used to the ship again.  Shiro, these are the MFE pilots and Commander Iverson. Iverson here has known you for longer than anybody else on the ship."

Immediately, Shiro zeroed in on the reading man.  "You have?"

"Yes."  Iverson set aside his tablet and stood.  He towered over Shiro, both bulky and tall, but then went down on one knee so they were almost at eye level.  He very seriously offered his hand. "I met you briefly before you joined the Garrison. But it's my honor to meet you again."

A little giggle escaped from Shiro, mostly from how weird it was to hear it was an adult's honor to meet him.  Very cool, but weird. He took the hand and shook, trying to make his grip as firm as he could manage. "It's nice to meet you again too, Sir."

Iverson smiled and rested his hand on top of Shiro's head, ruffling gently.  The expression flickered, like he was surprised at how small Shiro was in comparison, but he recovered quickly.  "I don't suppose I could invite Bennett on board for an afternoon." It was technically a question, but Iverson didn't say it like one.

One brow up, Sam snorted.  "If it was up to me? Sure.  But we're trying to keep this under wraps, and I don't think Admiral Keaton will feel very comfortable inviting an investigative reporter on board."

Snorting, Iverson nodded.  "I assumed as much. This will be classified after it's fixed?"

Sam just rolled his hand and smiled.  "Oh, take your picture. Just don't send it until after."

Without any further permission, Iverson fished a phone out of his pocket and held it up.  "Would you smile for me, Shiro?"

Obligingly, Shiro gave the camera a toothy grin.  "Do I have to say 'cheese?'" He asked through his smile.  He'd never understood that particular habit of his American peers.  

"No, you're fine without it."  Iverson took what looked like a couple of pictures, and then smiled back.  "Thank you. Bennett will be very upset to have missed out on this."

Shiro wrinkled his nose, not sure why someone would care about his picture.  But grown-ups always wanted pictures at inconvenient times, like before the first day of school or at parties.  It was just one of those annoying things he'd learned to deal with. "Okay. Who's Bennett?"

"My husband.  He knew you then too."  Iverson stood again. 

That made sense.  Shiro nodded distractedly, already looking around the room again.  All four of the 'MFE pilots' were watching the interaction. Most looked at least faintly amused, except for Griffin  His mouth hung open, clearly appalled. 

"Is that wise, Sir?"

Iverson's brow rose, somewhere between amused and stern.  "Why wouldn't it be?"

Griffin opened his mouth, then closed it.   Under the gaze of everyone in the room, he slumped at let out a sigh.  "Alright."

"It is technically illegal," the pale blonde said, her voice flat and steady.  "It's in violation of the Defence Act of 21-"

Before she could finish, the other woman nudged her with an elbow.  "It's not illegal if no one spills the beans."

"That's not how the law works, Rizavi!"  Griffin shot back.

"Who cares?" Asked the other, dark-skinned man.  He dropped his head back on the couch and rolled his hand as if to say 'get on with it.'

Rizavi snorted.  "You're just glad you don't have to stop filming while the Captain's around."

The man shrugged, not denying the tease at all.

Watching all this, Shiro frowned up at Iverson.  "Are you going to get in trouble?" He whispered.

"No, I won't," Iverson said.  "Would you like to sit down? Rizavi and Leifsdottir are a good match, so it should be a fun show.  Maybe you could play next."

That sounded better than being bored in his rooms or back in the medical wing.  So Shiro took that as permission and scrambled up on the couch next to the younger, dark-skinned man.  "Hello."

The man stuck out his hand.  "Kinkade."

"I'm Shiro."

"I know."

Griffin slowly sat down, then reached over Kinkade to offer his hand too.  "I'm James Griffin. Uh, nice to meet you."

Shiro shook that hand too, eyeing Griffin with narrowed eyes.  "Are you going to tattle?" He asked. Maybe it was a rude question, but he was the Captain.  They were his crew, and they had to listen to him. Like Sam said so, as long as he was grown.  He might be a bit younger, but he wasn't some little kid.

Up at the pool table, Rizavi let out a loud snort, then bent over as she started to snicker.  "Oh, lil Captain's got bite. I like it."

Griffin scowled at her, then regarded Shiro.  "I won't," he promised. "I don't want anyone in trouble.  I want to keep everyone on the ship safe, and sometimes the best way to do that is to follow the rules."

That made sense to Shiro.  He usually liked following the rules, too.  Some of them were annoying, like don't climb the trees in the backyard.  But some of them were just smart, like not running into the street. For the most part, Shiro trusted that the adults around him made them for good reasons, even if he didn't get it.  So he nodded agreeably and squirmed back comfortably against the thick couch cushions. "Okay."

The four watched him for a moment, as if waiting for more.  But when it was clear Shiro was content, they got back to the game.

When Leifsdottir won (and Rizavi complained loudly but fondly), both invited him up to teach him how to play.  The pool stick (cue, Leifsdottir corrected) was about half a foot taller than him, so it was difficult for him to maneuver.  But the floating arm was stronger than his natural one, and it was able to help compensate for that at least a little.

Even so, between the physical effort and the mental challenge of all those angles and calculations, Shiro was exhausted by the end.

(It probably also had something to do with how long a day it was.  But Shiro wasn't about to say that — it made him sound like a little kid.  Which he wasn't.)

By the end, he was drooping, so Kinkade physically lifted him up and set him down on the couch.  Shiro mumbled out a protest, only to get a baleful look in return.

"One round for us," Griffin said comfortingly, patting him on the shoulder.  "Kinkade and I have a rematch we need to do."

"Oh," Shiro mumbled, eyes falling closed.  "Sorry to hog the table."

"You definitely didn't," Rizavi said, a smile to her voice.  "Besides, both of them suck at it. It was way more fun to teach you how to play."

Kinkade made a vaguely protesting grunt, but otherwise didn't argue.  Then the conversation got quieter as the MFE pilots chatted easily among themselves, mostly trash talking.

The background noise was comforting, and Shiro let it lull him into comforting warmth, like a storybook being read.  So much so that he nearly missed Sam speak, suddenly right behind him.

"Mitch, do you want to look after him?" He asked, low and soft.  "He was your protege. You knew him best when he was youngest."

"Not this young," Iverson replied, just as gentle.  "I don't mind keeping an eye on him or talking with him, of course.  But you're the one who has experience with kids. I couldn't tell you what's normal or appropriate for a boy his age."

Sam snorted.  "You've met both of mine.  You think I know what's normal?"

That made Iverson laugh.  "Well, still better than me.  But let me know if you need someone to monitor him.  The MFEs too. I bet Shiro would love to see their ships."

Right, the MFEs were pilots.  That had been lost in the shuffle of meeting Iverson and the possibility of tattling.  Then they'd distracted him with the pool game, and he'd never had the chance to dwell on the introduction.  That was a horrible oversight — Shiro was definitely going to have to find out more.

"That's tomorrow," Sam said.  "And for all we know, he'll wake up tomorrow, right as rain."

"Is that likely?"

"No, just hopeful."  Sam sighed. "Then again, all this space and magic nonsense never stops surprising me.  So who knows?"

Iverson grunted his agreement, and they both faded into silence.  

Shortly after, Shiro faded as well.

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

"This is amazing!"  Shiro enthused, a grin splitting his face.  He stood on the pilot's chair so he could poke his head out the top of the MFE ship.  There wasn't enough space in them for a second passenger, which was a huge disappointment.  When he'd groaned, Rizavi had just plopped the smallest helmet they could find on him, shut down the controls, and let him sit inside all on his own.

Shiro had never seen anything like it.  He'd been to as many museums and exhibits on space travel as he could, so he'd sat at fake control panels before, mostly recreations of historical ships.  But this was different. First of all, it was real, and second of all, it was his. Or, at least, under his future command.

Shiro rested his arms on the edge of the canopy, absolutely giddy.  He felt like he could float into the air without a ship just from how excited he was.

"Amazing, huh?  Remember that when you're big," Rizavi called, shooting him an easy thumbs up.  She leaned against Kinkade's ship and grinned, clearly enjoying his enthusiasm. "When you remember your training, you should go for a spin.  Get a feel for what these babies can do. They're way better than the lions."

Shiro paused, pushing the sliding helmet back.  Even the smallest size was big on a ten year old, but it felt better to wear it.  "There are lions on the ship?" What did a spaceship need with lions?

Rizavi opened her mouth, then paused and dropped her arm.  "Huh. That's surreal. I don't even know how to answer that."

Pausing her inspection of her own ship, Leifsdottir considered Shiro.  "They are Altean ships designed in the shape of a creature similar to a lion.  Atlas' translation software conflates the two, but they are not identical. Altean lions do not show the same sexual dimorphism.  They don't have manes." The last she added at Shiro's obvious confusion at the large words "If you would like a better understanding, I suggest you ask the paladins.  They have by far the most experience. If not, you can ask Commander Holt."

Shiro draped himself over the side of the jet, eyes wide.  "Oh. That's cool too." Lion ships? The future was weird, but that was a new level.  But it was less important in the face of the actual jet he was currently standing in, and how much he wanted to fly in it.  So he turned to Rizavi and schooled his expression into confident professionalism. "I remember some stuff about being an adult," he assured, looking at Rizavi's glasses rather than meeting her eyes.  "I think I could still fly if you turned it on."

Kinkade snorted.  Loudly. His camera was still trained on Shiro.  From the way the lens twisted, Shiro suspected he was zooming in.  

Well, what did Kinkade know?  Shiro might know exactly how to fly.  They could at least give it a shot, rather than being rude about it.  

So Shiro stuck his tongue out.  Then he remembered that wasn't very adult of him, and he was trying to convince them to let him fly their cool planes.  He yanked it back in and blinked innocently at Rizavi, hoping she hadn't seen.

From her raised brow, he wasn't in luck.

"I dunno," Rizavi called, an open smirk in her voice.  "What do you think, Griffin? You want to say no to the Captain's request?  You're our leader, I think you have final say."

Griffin looked up from the console on the wall to shoot her a flat look.  "You started this."

"You'll thank me when this is all fixed and the Captain suddenly has a fond, nostalgic feeling for the MFEs."

Leifsdottir paused again.  His expression didn't really change, but something about the tilt of her head and her eyes was amused.  "Is that the reason for this game?"

"Nah," Rizavi said, flapping a hand.  "Who doesn't want to show off these babies?  They're gorgeous! But if it has side effects, I'm not complaining.  How about you, Captain? You feel used?"

"No," Shiro answered immediately, scenting an opening.  He shared a toothy smile with Rizavi, immediately on board with her game.  "I'd feel even more nostalgic later if I got to fly."

Griffin didn't look up from his own screen.  "I don't think that's a good idea."

"Aww," Rizavi said, slumping dramatically.  "Sorry, Captain."

Shoot.

Shiro started to sit down, then jolted back up as an idea struck. "What if Atlas flew the ship?"

This time, all four froze and stared at him.  Kinkade even aimed the camera at the floor so it was out of his view.  

"Can Atlas do that?"  Griffin asked, turning away from the computer completely.

...Could Atlas?

 _I am able to control basic systems,_ Atlas replied immediately, as if eager to show off.   _I do not have the same training or sense of self preservation as a pilot, but I can do simple maneuvers._

"She can!"  Shiro resisted the urge to whoop, still keen to convince them that he was mature.  "It wouldn't be me flying at all. It'd be like being in a self-driving car. Perfectly safe!  Atlas wouldn't hurt me."

Atlas practically glowed with happy warmth.   _I would not._

This time, Rizavi frowned thoughtfully.  Crossing her arms, she turned to Griffin.  "The lions can pilot themselves, right?" She asked.  "Atlas is kind of like them. Makes sense it could a simple loop.  If it turns out he's stretching the truth, the ship just won't go anywhere."

Griffin frowned, clearly thinking it over.  The longer he waited to speak, the harder Shiro's hopeful heart pounded.  "It's a useful ability to know about," he said slowly. "We still don't really know anything about Atlas' limits, but if one of us gets knocked out or hurt, it's good if Atlas can bring our ship in and get us to safety."

"Compared to the systems of Atlas herself, the jets are simplistic," Leifsdottir agreed, softer as she thought it through.  

Before they could compare more, the doors opened.  Sam walked in, a clipboard under his arm and a smile pulling at his lips.  "Hello. Any problems while I was gone?"

Immediately, Shiro stilled.  Sam had been nice so far, but he was a parent, and therefore no fun.  If he heard about the plan...

"It's been great!" Shiro chirped, happy as he could sound.  "Rizavi found me a helmet, see? And she let me look at her jet."

"I see that," Sam said.  He patted his pocket like he was looking for something, then looked at Kinkade. "You've been filming?"

Kinkade nodded and refocused his camera on Shiro.

Nodding back, Sam settled down, content now that he knew the scene was well recorded.

"If you need to keep working, I can stay here," Shiro continued on, not waiting for Sam to speak.  "I'm okay alone, too, you know. I stay home alone all the time when there's errands. And sometimes I go into the store alone to get things."

It had been a big mark of maturity, when Grandfather let him do those small tasks in the States.  He'd had to wait until his English was up to conversational status, and even then it had been a discussion.  This country was so much weirder about that stuff.

That had only been a couple of months ago.  Yet it felt like years.

When he pictured that day, how his grandfather had given him a comforting pat on his back and that proud smile...

Shiro's throat felt too tight.

"Actually, I was about to get you for lunch," Sam said.  "I figured you'd be hungry, and Hunk mentioned something about a recipe he thought you'd enjoy making with him."

Cooking instead of flying?  No way. Shiro had to figure out how to make Sam go away without making him suspicious.

But then Griffin turned to Sam, head tilted.  "Actually, Commander, before you go I have a question about Atlas."

Oh no.  Oh no _oh no._

Sam's brows rose.  He held his clipboard loosely against his chest and nodded.  "I can't answer everything, of course. Our resident expert is a little indisposed. But I can try."

How _could_ Griffin?  He was going to ruin everything!

"We can go eat," Shiro said, trying to pull himself out of the jet.  His arms scrambled against the smooth metal as he hopped up and down for purchase.  "I'm ready for lunch."

"Hey, there."  Kinkade put down his camera to climb the portable stairs.  He pulled Shiro out of the cockpit in one fell swoop, before he could go too far and fall out. "Careful."

Who had time to be careful?  This was too important!

But Griffin continued on, with only a glance back to make sure Shiro hadn't just face planted onto the concrete.  "Would Atlas be able to fly the jets? Shiro seems to think she can."

There was immediate, damning silence.

Shiro slumped in Kinkade's grasp, defeated.

"I've never heard of it," Sam said, merely thoughtful.  "But we've seen something similar. The paladins and lions are capable of similar feats.  Why-?" He suddenly paused. Slowly, his head turned to look at Shiro, one eyebrow up to his hairline.  "I hope this has been a purely theoretical discussion."

Griffin paused, clearly uncomfortable at the changed tone. "Of course, Sir," he said.  The traitor.

But Rizavi shrugged and stepped forward.  "If it was Atlas flying, would it be so bad?  It'd be like putting him on a roller coaster ride.  Sir."

"I don't advocate putting ten year olds on untested roller coasters.  Do you, Lieutenant?"

Rizavi held strong for a moment, then slumped.  "I tried. Sorry, kiddo. We can try the idea out sometime and see from there, okay?"

Ugh!  He had been so close!  Why did Sam have to come and ruin everything?  "It would be fine," Shiro said. He squirmed sulkily until Kinkade finally set him down on the portable stairs.  "Atlas isn't going to hurt me. I'd just get to actually do something fun."

Sam crossed his arms and stared Shiro down.  He didn't even blink at the sass, which was so annoying.  Wasn't Shiro supposed to be Captain? He was in charge of Sam, not the other way around.  Who cared that he was ten?

But one look at Sam's face told Shiro that his logic wasn't going to get him far.

"What did we discuss yesterday?" Sam asked.

"A lot of things," Shiro said.  He looked down at his boots rather than meet Sam's stern gaze.

"Specifically about staying safe in Atlas?"

Shiro's head shot up triumphantly.  He started down the stairs, chin up and confident, though he had to hold carefully onto the railing so he didn't slip.  "You said I was safe anywhere in the ship except for the room with the crystal. And you said I was safe because everyone was looking out for him."

Hah!  Sam's own words proved Shiro right.  So there.

"Outside of the ship is not part of Atlas," Sam said, utterly unfazed by either the argument or the tone.  "Looking out for you is exactly what I'm doing right now. My job is to keep you safe. You can fly later, when this is all fixed."

When he was a boring dumb adult who didn't do anything fun.  Sure. Whatever.

Shiro set his jaw and looked away, openly sulking.  It wasn't fair. Why had Sam come and take this away when he was so close to getting his dream.  To fly in a real ship that could go into space. It was so close, and one bad stroke of luck had ruined it.

Stepping over, Sam put a hand on Shiro's shoulder, which he immediately shook off.  Once rejected, Sam didn't try to touch again, but he didn't step away either. "How about we head to lunch for now?  Nothing's going to be solved in the next hour, and I think all this will look better after a nice meal."

What did lunch have to do with anything?  Sam just wanted Shiro to shut up and stop arguing.

But Shiro's best points had already been shot down, and it wasn't like he could run back into the jet and get away before Sam could stop him.  So Shiro huffed and nodded, but stayed pointedly silent. Instead he shot his betrayed glare onto Griffin, who winced.

"Atta boy," Sam said, perfectly cheerful.  As if it were all solved and happy. He gestured for the helmet, which Shiro took off and shoved over none too gracefully.  "We'll try again later. Thank you all again for letting Shiro see your ships."

"The Captain was no trouble at all," Rizavi answered easily, taking the helmet back.  Rather than look put out by Shiro's mood, she seemed to find it funny. "If you get bored of the paladins, feel free to come hang out with us again, okay, kiddo?"

Shiro glared at Griffin again, who looked away.  That would be more satisfying if he looked properly guilty, and not amused.  "Maybe," he allowed. The other three were good, and he knew Veronica spent time with them too, and she had been nice this morning.  If Griffin apologized and helped him later, then maybe he could be okay too.

Shiro waved his goodbyes as Sam ushered him out and down the hallway.

The kitchen, like the rest of the living quarters section of Atlas, was relatively close to both hangars.  Despite the short walk, they crossed paths with multiple soldiers going about their day. Each stopped to salute, and while they usually greeted Sam first, they also referred to Shiro as Captain.

He wasn't an idiot.  Shiro knew they found his title funny or cute, not that they really respected the authority of a ten year old.  But even so, he was their boss. Of everyone, including Commander Holt. So why was Shiro supposed to listen to Sam, anyway?  Why did the MFEs listen to him and not to Shiro? It wasn't fair! Sam wasn't anybody to Shiro. Not his superior officer and not his family.  Sure, he was his elder, but that wasn't everything.

By the time they reached the kitchens, Shiro had worked himself up into a proper sulk.

Only to forget about his anger when he saw Hunk.

"What are you _wearing?"_

Hunk beamed and adjusted his chef's hat with one of his mittened hands. Each depicted what looked like some sort of colorful creature, with the palm and fingers making the mouth. On his feet were a pair of equally bright slippers, showing the same beings. "I haven't had a chance to use these in a while. I figured this was a good use."

Sam poorly hid his smile behind his hand. "Very flattering, Hunk."

"Thank you."

A glance around the room proved the other paladins were clearly amused as well. Most were settled at the table, clustered around Pidge and her laptop, but they waited like they expected a big reaction.

Shiro shifted from foot to foot. "I don't get it, sorry. Is this from when I'm older?"

"Oh," Pidge breathed, slumping back in her chair. "Yeah, you wouldn't know. Well, we're stupid."

"That is odd to hear," Allura said.  "But I suppose no one has explained Voltron to you, Shiro. Unless Atlas did?"

Had she?

...Atlas?

There was a long pause. _It's not important,_ Atlas said.  

Huh.  Shiro shook his head slowly.  "No, sorry. What's a Voltron?"

"It's a ship, like Atlas," Sam said.  "Has anyone told you about the lions? They form together to make a bigger ship, and that's Voltron."

Oh!  That was what the MFEs had been talking about.  But... Lion-shaped ships came together to make a bigger ship?  Why? Shiro crinkled his nose as he stared up at Sam, not sure he if he was kidding.

"It's not a big deal," Hunk said.  "Sorry, we just forgot. Are you ready for lunch?  We were just going to have sandwiches, but I figured that they'd be more fun with chips.  Do you want to learn how to make them?"

Shiro's eyes widened.  "You can make chips?" He'd only ever seen them in the store, so he thought it was like candy.  The kind of thing that just showed up at grocery stores pre-made.

"You sure can," Hunk said.  He ushered Shiro over with a grand gesture from his mittens.  When he wandered over, Hunk pulled off the chef's hat and dropped it on Shiro's head.  Like the fighter pilot helmet, it slid down to Shiro's brow. Once it was on, he handed over the mitts as well. "Perfect.  Now I got you to wear this twice. The kind of chips we're going to make are a little different than the ones in the bags. Those are fried, and that's a little messy.  The kind we're making are baked, and we can try a few difference spices to see what flavor you like best. How's that sound?"

The last of Shiro's frustration melted away.  That actually sounded like fun. Not as fun as flying, but a worthy way of spending lunch.  "Okay. How do we do that?"

"Well, first, we need to clean a bunch of these."  Hunk held up a red potato, grinning. "Lance, you want to help out?"

"Actually, I had a question for Commander Holt."  Lance stood up like he was trying to be casual, but couldn't quite manage.  "It's a little private, though. Can we take this to the hallway?"

Sam nodded.  "Certainly." He gestured for Lance to head through the door first, then closed it firmly behind him.

Okay, that was suspicious.  Like an unmarked, off limits box a week before his birthday.

Shiro stared after, eyes narrowed.

Clearing his throat nervously, Hunk turned to the rest of the group.  "Keith? You want to help instead? It's going to be a lot of cutting."

"You don't need to say that like knives are my life's passion."  Despite this comment, Keith rolled up his sleeves and moved to the sink to wash up.  "Yeah, I'll help. Just washing for now? What about you, Allura?"

Allura eyed the small mountain of waiting potatoes with something like distrust.  "I'm best used as an Alchemist right now, I'm afraid." She nodded to Pidge's computer, her eyes darting significantly to Shiro.

Trying to fix whatever had made him younger, then.  

"Alright," Hunk said, a hint of laughter in his voice.  He dropped a potato into Shiro's hand and gave him a nudge to the sink.  "The skins are staying on for these, so wash carefully in cold water. Don't use soap or anything, but there's a brush for scrubbing.  You don't want to eat whatever dirt got on these in shipping, okay?"

Eugh, no.  Shiro nodded and made his way to the sink.  It was definitely not made for someone his age in mind, but if he went on his tiptoes he was fine.  Then he flipped on the water and started to scrub. When he finished, Keith took them to dry them off, and Hunk handed him another.

It didn't require a lot of thought, so instead Shiro dwelt on whatever Sam and Lance were talking about.  If it had been just Sam, he would have thought it was worth stuff, but Lance was just too obvious. What did they need to talk about away from him?  Why were they keeping secrets again. He'd thought they were over that, but apparently not. Shiro should be able to listen.

_Would you like to listen, Captain?_

Shiro paused, heart picking up.  He could do that?

Rather than an answer, there was a sensation like Shiro's ears popping.  Then—

 _"—been looking for things to do with my niece and nephew,"_ Lance said, clear as day.  There was a slight mechanical quality, like listening over a microphone, but otherwise it was like he was still in the room. _"You know, age appropriate, engaging.  They're a little younger than him right now, but they're closer than us.  And there's that little festival thing they're doing in town to celebrate rebuilding, and I thought..."_

He trailed off pointedly.

Hope bloomed in Shiro's heart.  A festival sounded fun. He hadn't done one in a long time.  Apparently there were aliens on Earth now, so maybe it was different than those, but that could be even better.  He could go to an _alien_ party.

Sam gave a long, sad sigh.

The hope curled up as Shiro's chest went cold.

 _"It's a nice thought,"_ Sam said.

 _"We can look after three kids,"_ Lance interjected quickly.   _"No problem.  Shiro's not nearly as spitfire as ours can get.  My whole family will be there, so it's not like it's just me.  And I'm sure Hunk would like to go, too. Maybe the others. It won't be a bother."_

 _"That's not the problem,"_ Sam said. _"We've managed to keep Shiro's condition limited to the ship so far.  Even most of the IGF and the former Garrison doesn't know. And if he looked like he did at ten, it would be more reasonable.  But he looks like himself now. The hair, the arm, everything. It won't take a genius to connect them. Even if they don't think he's deaged, they'll think he's related.  He’ll be a target."_

_"Oh.  Even—?"_

"—Shiro?"

Shiro startled, blinking at the running tap.  He looked up at Keith, frowning. "What?"

"We're all done."  Keith gestured to the small pile of potatoes next to him.  "You zoned out. Are you okay?"

"Just daydreaming," Shiro replied quickly.  He took Keith's towel to carefully dry off his hands, listening again for the conversation.  But his concentration was broken, and it was difficult to listen again when he had to pay attention to his surroundings again.

Instead, his stomach twisted.  Another fun thing to do, and Sam stopped it.  Why was he doing this? Was he mad at Shiro? Had he done something when he was big to make Sam want to get back at him?  

He pressed his lips thin, torn between anger and hurt.  Maybe he shouldn't have listened like that. If he hadn't, then he wouldn't know about the fun festival he wasn't allowed to go to, just because Sam didn't like him.

Shiro blinked rapidly against frustrated tears. He hadn't done anything wrong.  Why was he being punished?

"Woah, hey, you okay?"  Hunk sank down, sitting on his heels so he was closer to Shiro's height.  "What's wrong, buddy?"

"Nothing," he said, mostly managing to keep his voice even.  "I'm fine. Can we go back to cooking?"

Hunk eyed him for a moment, even looking up at Keith in askance, as if he was in charge of Shiro's feelings.  But finally he sighed and nodded. "Okay, but you have to be careful about this next part, okay? We're going to cut up the potatoes, and it'll take a real knife.  Think you can do that?"

Immediately, Shiro snapped to attention.  Finally! A way to prove he wasn't some dumb little kid, and he could be trusted to do fun things.  "Yes, I can definitely do it." He pushed up the slumping chef's hat and puffed out his chest so he'd look bigger.

Pidge peered over the top of her screen.  "You sure about that, Hunk?"

"Why not?"  Hunk shrugged.  "We'll start slow and make sure he's fine.  But I was chopping ingredients when I was his age.  Besides, I live in hope that he'll pick up some skills while he's impressionable and they'll stick around when he's older."

Keith rested a hand on Shiro's shoulder. "I could use my knife pretty well by ten too," he added.  "And we'll be keeping an eye on him. If he gets a knick, we'll get him a bandage. No big deal."

"See, that doesn't make me feel better," Pidge drawled.  But despite her words, she did relax and sink back below the screen.

Allura leaned against the side of the table to watch.  "Your food preparation is so complex," she observed. "The goo is far simpler."

"Are you arguing with the taste?" Hunk asked, grinning as he pulled out a couple of cutting boards and knives.

There was a pause, like Allura was desperately trying to.  Then she sighed and slumped. "I suppose not."

"That's what I thought."  Radiating self-confidence, Hunk set up the boards and picked up a red potato.  "Okay, these are small, so that means you have to be extra careful. There's not as many places to hold it where your fingers aren't in the way.  Go slow as you need to. I'll be more mad if I see you rushing than if you keep your pace steady. Got it?"

Shiro's jaw worked, but he could see the reason of that, so he nodded.  He didn't want to have this taken away too. "Got it."

"Good.  Now, these need to be pretty thin, since they're going to be chips.  So like this." Hunk demonstrated, resting the tip of his knife against the cutting board and smoothly rocking it down.  Rather than shift around the knife, he barely seemed to move it, just lift and drop. A small pile of thin, round pieces of potato began to pile up on the other side.

It didn't take an expert to know that Hunk was clearly very good at this.  Shiro watched with wide eyes, lips parting gently. He used a knife to cut up his meals at dinner, depending on what they were eating, but it had never looked as easy as that.

"You think you can do that?" Hunk asked.

Just like that?  No, probably not.  But Shiro was game to try.  So he nodded and carefully took the offered knife.

Shiro did his best to copy the movements, though he was far slower.  It felt awkward, even when the edge cut cleanly through the potato. The first piece was kind of thin, and the one after was even better, but the third was far too thick.

Reaching over, Keith took the too-thick bit and cut it smoothly in half.  Then he put them all back and hovered his hand over Shiro's. "Can I show you something?"

Frowning, Shiro looked up at him through his bangs.  "I can do it," he insisted. His protest was slightly undermined by his cat-like mittens and the hat slipping down again.

"I know you can.  I'm just giving advice."

Shiro considered it, then finally nodded.  "Okay."

Taking Shiro's hand, Keith pulled off the mitts, then carefully readjusted his fingers.  He changed Shiro's grip so his thumb was flat along the blade, rather than holding it in a fist like he was trying to jab it.  "Try now."

At first, Shiro only stared dubiously.  His hold felt less secure now than it had before.  But when he tried to cut again, he found his fingers weren't in the way of the board, and he was able to follow through more comfortably.  "Oh!' He smiled, pleased at himself for doing a better job. "Thank you, Keith!"

"Mhmm." With that, Keith went back to his own cutting, smoothly chopping up his own potato.

Still smiling warmly, Shiro leaned sideways, so he could press his arm against Keith's side.  He had been the best of all the adults so far, even the MFEs. He was quiet and careful, but he treated Shiro like an equal and he was nice.  Besides, he was the one who really knew Shiro.

At first, Keith paused, surprised.  But a smile curled up the side of his lips as he leaned back into it.  The angle was a little awkward while cutting, but Shiro didn't mind at all.  He liked the contact with someone he trusted.

It took Shiro much longer to work than Keith or Hunk. By the time he was done with one, they were both on his third, and his slices weren't as regular as theirs.  But Shiro still beamed at his little pile. They might be a little messy and not as thin, but those were his. He'd be able to use the knife safely and did a good job, so there.

"I think that's good," Hunk declared.  He pulled out a couple of cooking sheets and set them down.  "So, now we're going to lay all the slices out. Make sure they're not overlapping if you can help it, but try to get as many as you can in here.  If we need a few of these, that's fine, but then it'll take two rounds of baking. Then, once they're done, we'll add some oil, the salt and pepper, and any other spices we want.  When that's done, we'll put them in the oven to get them nice and crispy."

Shiro nodded determinedly, still riding off his most recent success.  He started to lay out the potato slices, carefully moving them around so they were all flat and just barely touching.  It was like a puzzle, where the round pieces didn't quite fit perfectly into the square pan, but he did his best. At some point, his tongue poked out over his top lip and his brows came together in intense concentration.

Once that was done, Hunk grinned and ruffled Shiro's hair.  "Great job! I'm going to add the oil, and after that you can add the salt, okay?  But be gentle. Too much salt means you won't want to eat them anymore."

Another responsibility.  Shiro's chest puffed out as he nodded.  "I can do that."

"I know you can."  Hunk gave him another smile, then started to drizzle the oil over the pans.  He gave them a gentle shake, spreading the oil without moving the slices, then gave Shiro a small container of salt.

Tongue out again, Shiro braced one knee on the table as he leaned in close.  He held the container over the pans and started to shake.

"You can pinch some out," Hunk interjected quickly, clearly fighting a wince.  "It makes it easier to control how much salt comes out."

Shiro looked down at the container, then frowned at Hunk.  "Isn't it bad to put my fingers in there?"

"You washed your hands while you were cleaning the potatoes.  So this time it's okay."

Shrugging, Shiro pinched out the salt and started to sprinkle that instead.  With his smaller hands, it took a while to evenly cover everything, but it was easier then shaking and hoping not a lot came out.

Once the salt and pepper were on, they added some cheese onto one section, and chili powder onto another.  By the time Hunk declared it all ready, Shiro's stomach was rumbling for their labor.

"How long until they're ready?"  Shiro asked. He slumped against the table as Hunk put the pans in the oven, shoving the stupid hat out of his eyes yet again.  This time, it immediately fell down again, like it had given up completely.

Hunk hummed thoughtfully.  "Depends on this oven, honestly.  I don't know their quirks yet. But about twenty-five minutes—"

Groaning, Shiro put his face down on the table.

"—per side."

Per side?  So twice that!  Fifty whole minutes until they could have their chips.  What was the point, then? They could have just gotten a bag and eaten it right away.  Shiro rested his chin on the table and gave Hunk his most baleful stare.

Keith took one look at Shiro's wounded expression and snorted.  "I think you broke his heart, Hunk."

"Poor Captain," Lance cooed.  His voice made Shiro startle and glance over.  He leaned against the wall by the door, grinning easily as if nothing at all was wrong.

Just like that, Shiro's stomach sank again.  Right. The festival he wasn't allowed to go to.  Sam hadn't even come back in, so Shiro couldn't argue with him.

"We'll have our sandwiches while we wait," Hunk said, closing the oven door.  "No one's going to starve in the next hour, I promise."

As Hunk and Lance worked to set up the sandwich buffet, Shiro scooted his chair around, peering at Pidge's laptop.  Green text flashed by, which didn't look like it was in English or in Japanese. Another window on the corner showed some kind of data, and what looked like a picture of something glowing.

"Wanna see?"  Pidge asked. She tilted the laptop over so Shiro didn't have to strain so far.  "Probably not super interesting. Unless you were taking programming lessons at ten and you never told me.  In which case, I'm kicking your butt when you're big again."

Shiro shook his head.  "No, I don't know any of this.  What does it mean?"

"Well," Pidge said, drawing out the word.  "This is a program that's tracing all the energy in Atlas right now.  We can't go back and see where the energy came from before, since we didn't have anything like this.  But now we're looking so if it happens again, we'll know what's causing it. And if we see any weird energy fluctuations in the meantime, we might be able to guess what started it."

"So no one gets made younger like me?"

Pidge nodded.  "That, and if we figure out how it happened, then we can figure out how to undo it.  Or, more likely, Allura can." She gestured over her other shoulder, where Allura was watching the sandwich buffet get set up.

Startling at her name, Allura turned.  "Hm? Oh, yes. It's just a matter of reversing the energy.  Well, not just. That was a lot of power that Atlas had built up, and I'll need to match it.  But we'll be closer."

Neither of them seemed particularly worried about it, which was nice.  Shiro being younger for a little while wasn't a huge, scary thing to them.  No one on the ship had reacted all that much to him being ten, come to think of it.  It didn't scare Shiro, because he felt ten. This was how he was supposed to be, admittedly with weird hair and a different arm.

"Has this happened before?" Shiro asked.

Pidge crinkled her nose.  "No, not really."

At the same moment, Allura nodded. "Yes, it has."

Both Pidge and Shiro turned to stare at her, eyes wide.  Shiro's had slumped again, and this time he took it off completely.

"When Coran and I were in the time rift, remember?"  Allura said. "He kept getting younger. Mind, by far greater jumps than Shiro did, until he was a baby at the end.  None of them lasted this long, either. Luckily we were able to undo the loop before something dire happened. But it's certainly happened before."

"Huh.  Right. I forgot about that."

"You all were quite busy at the time as well, if I recall."

Shiro looked at the computer again, watching the scrolling symbols.  "What happens if you don't fix it?"

Pidge's head snapped back to Shiro.  "Of course we going to fix this. As far as these things go, it's complicated but at least it's not actively dangerous.  So long as you don't go sticking your hand in glowing energy crystals again." She shrugged and snapped her laptop closed.  "Don't worry about it. As soon as we know what's wrong, we'll get you put right in no time."

Okay, but what if Shiro didn't want to get bigger?  Everyone else want him to be a grown-up again. Was that why Sam was punishing him?

As Shiro lapsed into thoughtful silence, Allura reached down and gently pushed his hair back. She pulled her hand back quickly, like she wasn't sure she should have done that, but when Shiro looked up she was smiling.  "Everything will be back to normal before you know it. We'll fix this for you, I promise." Her expression was soft, but there was a hint of pain to it. A sadness that couldn't be hidden.

These were all grown-up Shiro's friends.  Not ten-year-old Shiro's friends. None of them had known him nearly that long, so of course they wanted their version of him back.  Shiro didn't remember Voltron or any of them. It must not be very fun for him.

Everyone on this ship wanted the grown up version of Shiro back.  Even the MFEs had hung out with him because they hoped he'd like them more as an adult, not as a ten year old.

"Okay."  Swallowing hard, Shiro nodded.  He pushed his chair back and made his way across the kitchen, not meeting Pidge or Allura's eyes.  Then he put his hand on Hunk's arm to catch his attention. "Can I eat lunch in my room?"

Hunk paused, then glanced down at Shiro.  "You sure? The chips are going to be ready before you know it."

Shiro nodded, his jaw set and his stomach twisting.  He didn't want to be here. He wanted to be with his own friends and his grandfather. But he couldn't.  Because they were gone and Shiro was far away. "I'm sure. I'm tired. Yesterday was weird and I was up early today.  I just want to eat and relax a little bit."

"Aren't you a bit old to be wanting nap time?" Lance teased, ruffling his hair.

Tensing, Shiro shook his head, accidentally knocking the hand away.  "It's not a nap! I was going to read."

"Lance is just teasing you, Shiro.  Of course you can eat in your room. Here, what do you want in your sandwich?"  Hunk pulled over a piece of bread and piled on everything Shiro pointed to. "There you go.  We'll tell Atlas to call when the chips are done, and you can decide if you want to come out.  That sound good?"

Shiro nodded, taking a plate and his sandwich.  "That's good, yes. Thank you."

"No problem."  Hunk's smile was unsure as he looked Shiro over.  "If anything's worrying you, then you can definitely talk to us or Commander Holt, okay?  We care about you."

Shiro nodded agreeably, even if his heart wasn't fully in it.  "Yeah, I know." With that, he turned and walked out, letting Atlas close the door behind him.

The second they couldn't see him, Shiro turned to put his ear to the door.  But then he remembered he had a better way.

Atlas responded to the thought immediately, and then Shiro could hear voices.

 _"What did you say to him?"_ Keith asked, voice sharp.

 _"Nothing!"_  Pidge didn't sound very happy either. _"We just said we were going to fix this fast.  It's not even a lie."_

 _"He's had a long day, like he said,"_ Lance said.  Even without knowing him long, Shiro could picture him holding up his hands to try and stop the tension.  Or maybe it was his weird sense of future-knowledge. _"It's a lot for him to adjust to.  And Shiro's a quiet guy, so he was probably a quiet kid.  Giving him some privacy doesn't mean something's wrong."_

There was a beat before Allura responded.   _"Lance is right.  I'm sure Shiro just needs time to himself."_

Hunk sighed. _"If he's not feeling better in a while, we'll check on him.  For now, we should work on fixing this. You mind me looking at your laptop, Pidge?"_

_"Asking permission?  That's new."_

_"Hey!"_

Shiro closed his eyes and stepped away.  "That's enough, Atlas."

The voices stopped.

For a long moment, Shiro stared at the door, plate gripped in both hands.  His stomach churned with more emotions than he knew what to do with. Everyone was so nice, but they'd wanted to lie to him, and they wanted their real friend back.  Shiro wanted to storm back inside and yell, to tell them he was just as good now as he was in the future. To make them feel bad for making him feel bad.

But it wasn't their faults, was it?  Their friend had gone away. Nothing Shiro could say could make them stop missing him.  And adult-Shiro was the real Captain. Everyone else was just pretending because they thought it was cute.  They didn't really know now-Shiro. He was just some kid who would be their actual friend again eventually. Why should they let him do anything when he was going to be gone soon?

Face screwing up, Shiro turned and raced down the hall.  He didn't need to ask directions, not in Atlas, so he kept his head down and hoped no one could see his red cheeks.  None of the soldiers who passed seemed to notice, and it was only a few halls until Shiro slipped into his rooms.

Adult-Shiro's rooms were fancy, as befitting the Captain of the ship.  They had an attached living room and kitchen space, all kept neat and orderly.  From the lack of wear and mess, Shiro guessed that his adult self didn't spend a lot of time in this section.  Mostly just his bedroom.

In defiance of him, Shiro marched his way to the couch and sat down heavily.  He dropped his plate into his lap and chewed sulkily on his sandwich. Part of him hoped the mayo would get all over this nice, stupid couch.  Then when everyone got back their Shiro, he'd come back to a sticky, stinky couch. Just like he deserved.

There was a nudge in the back of his mind.   _You are upset, Captain._

No, he wasn't.  Shiro was fine. Everything was fine.  Who cared what everyone around thought, right?  Atlas liked him, and that was all he needed.

....Atlas liked him, right?

_I love you, Captain._

Shiro relaxed, but then froze around another bite of his sandwich.  Atlas loved the Captain, but did she love Shiro how he was now?

There was a long silence.   _I do not understand the difference.  You are Captain. You are my bonded. I love you._

Yes, but they were different, weren't they?  Everyone else wanted back the adult-Shiro. If there wasn't something different between them, why not just let Shiro stay ten?

 _I am not bonded to your age,_ Atlas said. _I am bonded to your heart.  You are still you._

A rush of affection rolled through Shiro, so powerful he wasn't sure if it came from him or from Atlas.  Maybe both. Smiling, Shiro put aside his sandwich to hug one of the couch pillows to his chest. "I love you too, Atlas."

This time, the bubbling warmth was definitely from Atlas.

_Why are you upset, Captain?_

Oh, right.  Shiro dropped his face to the pillow, then pulled his knees up to his chest.  He was still wearing his shoes in his room, which was wrong. He hoped his future self was mad about it.  

"No one is letting me do anything fun," Shiro admitted.  "Sam keeps stopping it. Lance was going to take me to a festival.  An alien festival! But Sam won't let him!"

There was a pause. _This is the conversation I helped you hear._

Well, yes, it was.

This time the silence was longer. _It upset you to hear.  Should I have not done that?_

That wasn't it.  Yes, Shiro had wished he hadn't heard before, but that wasn't the point!  The point was that Sam should definitely let him go to the festival. Who cared what he looked like?  That was a dumb excuse to not let him go.

This time, Atlas was silent.

Shiro buried his face in the pillow.  Even Atlas didn't think he should have fun?  Why did no one think he could do anything?

 _You can have fun,_ Atlas said hurriedly.   _What would be fun for you?_

Well, the festival would be fun.  But Shiro could just imagine getting caught on the way out and how much trouble he'd be in.  He didn't even know where or when it was, either. Besides, Shiro thought that was cool, but it wasn't what had made him mad in the first place.  He'd take no festivals if he could get what he really wanted.

"I want to fly."

Atlas went silent. _I cannot take off at this time._

Yeah, Shiro knew.  Atlas wasn't doing it for any dumb reason either.  She didn't have her supplies and crew yet, so she wasn't ready.  Besides, that wasn't the same as being in one of the fighter jets like the MFEs.  Those were so cool. Just him and the open sky, the weightlessness of space, stars spread infinitely around him.  When Shiro closed his eyes, he could imagine it so perfectly.

There was a surge of triumph.   _I can do that._

Atlas could help him fly?

_I can turn off gravity._

Shiro's breath caught.  No gravity? Like being out in space, but inside Atlas where he was perfectly safe, just like Sam had said.  That was perfect! "Please? Atlas, that would be amazing!"

Pride washed over him, but then Atlas paused. _I cannot just do your rooms, however.  A complete seal is not possible with the residential doorways.  They are not meant for that._

Wait, did that mean Atlas wasn't going to do it?  No! Why was everyone teasing Shiro like this? Letting him get so close to his dream, to the one thing he wanted above everything, then taking it away at the last moment.  If they could do it, then no more lying and taking it away. Why did everyone _hate_ him?

Atlas scrambled in his mind, horrified at Shiro's changing mood. _No! I can do it! I will make you fly, Captain._

The air around Shiro seemed to shift and surge, as if it was all being moved around.

Then his stomach twisted as he slowly lifted off a couple of inches off the couch.

He was flying.

Shiro let out a gleeful cry as he kicked his legs. His foot caught one of the pillows, making it float all the way across the room and smack into the wall. It bounced off and scraped against the ceiling instead.

Catching on, Shiro gave a gentle shove off the couch. He raised a couple inches into the air, but there was still air in the room. The resistance slowed him down from his gentle nudge, leaving him floating perfectly in the air.

It was perfect.

"This is amazing!" Shiro twisted, brushing his fingers against the top of the couch until he had enough momentum to spin in the air. "Atlas, how do you do this?"

 _I am creating an artificial gravity environment in the ship, just as I could do during flight,_ Atlas informed him, full of pride. _You like it?_

Like? Shiro loved this! It was everything he'd ever wanted in his entire life. He'd dreamed of the stars for as long as he could remember, spent countless nights with his junior telescope, eagerly telling his mother about all the constellations they could see. He already had all the ones around Earth memorized, and he wanted to learn them all.

Now he was doing it inside a living room.

Tears burned at Shiro's eyes. He wiped at them with the new robot arm, then stared at the prosthesis above him. It circled along with him, just as much a reactive part of his body as his left despite not being connected.

His arm was gone.

He was sick. Shiro knew that. It had hit his mother harder than it had him. She'd cried for hours after, while Shiro hadn't seen the big deal. He had until he was in his 30s. That had seemed like forever. Shiro was just glad he was going to learn how to fix his arms so he'd stop being clumsy.

As he got older, Shiro started to realize how young that was. It was still an adult. Ancient, really. But it was a third as long as anyone else. He'd started to worry that wasn't long enough. Average age for astronauts was getting lower, but they still only rarely sent anyone younger than 30.

But he'd done it. Adult-Shiro hadn't just gone to space. He was in charge of an entire spaceship.

He was going to do it.  Despite everything, despite the dire warnings from the doctors, despite his mother's tears.  Shiro was going to be in charge of the coolest spaceship ever and defend the entire universe.

Spreading his arms and legs, Shiro used his toes to stop his spin, and instead let himself lay out as if he was on a cloud. He stayed in the air, held perfectly still, and just breathed.

This was what it meant to fly. No weird aches, no limits, no ticking clocks. Just him and the stars. And Atlas.

Shiro wasn't sure how long he laid there, just enjoying the feeling he'd waited his whole life for.

Then, the door to his rooms opened.

Sam stood there, gripping the door frame to keep in place. One foot was pressed firmly to the ground like an anchor, while the other floated awkwardly in the air.

He looked very, very angry.

 _"Takashi Shirogane,_ was this you?"

Uh oh.


	3. Chapter 3

"What were you thinking?"  Sam asked. His hands were balled up at his side, and his cheeks were flushed.

Shiro stared down at his lap, fingers curled into the fabric of his pants.  In his head, Atlas was equally silent and radiating guilt.

The room was in utter disarray now that gravity had been restored.  Nothing here had been prepared for temporary weightlessness. While Shiro had been floating around, everything else had too, if only in small amounts.  All the books had come off the shelf and were scattered over the floor, joined by all the papers and documents that used to be organized on his older self's desk.  One of the kitchen cabinets had come open, and several plates just barely balanced on the edge. A mug had managed to come out, and when gravity came back, it shattered on the counter.  Most of the furniture had survived intact, but all of it was off now, moved inches or even feet from where they'd started.

Shiro hadn't touched any of those things while he'd been floating, but he didn't need to.  Earth was in constant motion, rotating and orbiting and whizzing through space. It didn't feel like it, but it was enough to send everything in the room into chaos.

And that was just Shiro's personal quarters.  The rest of the ship had to be even worse.

Which was why Sam was here now.

And it was why he was so mad.

The silence hung between them, heavy and aching.  Shiro's throat felt too tight, and a tremble ran through him.

"Well?"  Sam rolled his hand expectantly, fast and jerky.  "What exactly did you think you were doing?"

"I don't know."  Now matter how hard Shiro tried to control it, his voice shook.  "I didn't think it would do anything bad."

Sam crossed his arms, utterly unmoved.  "What did you think was going to happen?"

Shiro winced.  The truth was, he hadn't thought about it at all.  Atlas had said that he could fly in zero gravity, and every other thought had flown from his head.  She'd even tried to tell him it wasn't just his room, but it hadn't mattered. "I thought I was going to float.  I didn't think it would be a big deal."

"And did you know it would affect everyone?"

Tightening up his shoulders, Shiro bit his bottom lip.  "Um."

The tension in the room got heavier.

"I didn't know it would hurt anything!"  Shiro finally picked his head up and clenched his jaw against a tremble.  "I just thought everyone would fly for a little while. It's a spaceship, they should be able to work like that.  Isn't that their jobs?"

From the way Sam's eyes narrowed, he didn't appreciate that little comment.  He stepped forward and kneeled in front of Shiro. The equal height should have made them feel more comfortable, but instead it didn't let Shiro duck his face away anymore.  He had to look at Sam's tense expression in turn. There was nowhere to hide anymore. 

"Do you know what happened when you turned off the gravity in the ship?" 

Shiro shook his head.  How was he supposed to know that?

"You turned it off  _ everywhere. _  For example, you turned it off in the engine rooms, where people were working on very heavy equipment with very dangerous tools.  You also turned off gravity in the infirmary, where there were hazardous materials and injured patients. You turned off gravity in everyone's quarters, where they could easily have fragile, personal, irreplaceable objects.  You turned off gravity on everyone in the ship, no matter what they were doing or how they felt about it. People probably were hurt. They could very well have been killed. Do you understand me?"

Stomach sinking, Shiro stared with wide eyes.

He hadn't thought about any of that.  Not for a second. It had never occurred to him that he could hurt anything, item or person.  

"I didn't know," Shiro repeated, voice rising up as he stared at Sam's hard expression.  "I didn't know any of that! How was I supposed to know that would happen?"

"Did you even think first?"

Shiro looked down at his lap again, blinking back the burn behind his eyes.  His breathing became watery and short, no matter how hard he tried to fight it.

There was a shift beside Shiro on the couch.  Sam didn't touch him, and he still radiated frustration, but sitting was better than the direct stare.  "You have to think these things through, Shiro. You have a lot of power on this ship. Atlas listens to you more than anyone else.  You're the Captain, and that means you have a responsibility. Your actions affect everyone. I know that's difficult to do at this age.  Things sound like a good idea, and you don't see the full picture. But you have to be more careful, because otherwise people could get serious hurt."

That wasn't fair.  That wasn't _ fair!   _ Shiro hadn't asked for any of this.  He hadn't wanted to wake up in the future where he wasn't allowed to have any fun.  It had just happened beyond his control, and now he had to double think everything he wanted to do.

Why had this happened to him?  Why had Shiro woken up to a world that wanted a different version of him and trapped him in the role of an adult without any of the freedom?

Wiping over his eyes, Shiro resisted the urge to kick the coffee table.  It had floated closer while the gravity was gone, and now sat at an odd angle.  "I wouldn't have done it if I'd been allowed to fly before."

Sam stiffened.  Slowly, he turned to face Shiro, expression flat.  "Excuse me?"

That was a dangerous phrase, but Shiro set his shoulders.  It was true. If Sam had just let him fly the jets or go to the festival, then Shiro wouldn't have needed to make his own fun.

"I only did it because I wanted to fly, and Atlas told me how I could do it." Shiro forced himself to keep his chin up and steady.  Part of him cringed, knowing this was a bad idea, but he didn't want to just take his blame. That would mean he'd been wrong, and Shiro didn't want that.  "If you hadn't said no, I wouldn't have had to turn off gravity."

Sam's lips pressed tightly.  He pushed himself back off the couch until he was standing over Shiro again.  "I don't care what I said no to," he said, each word clipped and icy. "That doesn't give you the right to circumvent me.  I told you no for a reason. Flying in an untested system is far too dangerous right now. And that doesn't mean you weren't thoughtless.  You're the Captain of Atlas, and you have to-"

"Then I don't want to be Captain!"  Shiro surged to his feet too, fists clenched in front of his chest.  "If it means I never get to do anything, then I don't want it! You be Captain, then!"

_ No!  _  Atlas said, speaking for the first time since the gravity had come back.  _  I don't want a new Captain! _

Well, Shiro wanted to go to festivals and fly.  It wasn't fair.

"I  _ can't!"   _ Sam threw up his hands, finally breaking into a true yell.  "You think I want a ten year old to have this responsibility?  Of course I don't! If I'd been there, I would have told them all not to tell you.  There's no reason you should have to deal with that, or be in charge of a state of the art, one of a kind ship.  But I can't take it from you. No one can. There is no one else who can be Captain of the Atlas but you. So, yes, I'm going to keep you safe, and you have to actually think before you do something that affects the entire ship.  You shouldn't have this power, but you do, and you can't be  _ stupid  _ about it."

Shiro wasn't stupid.  

Despite everything, what stung was that Sam had wanted to lie to him.  He'd wanted to take away Shiro's position even from the beginning. Shiro had wanted it to go away, but not because it was being hidden from him.  Not because everyone was lying to his face.

Shiro had said he could handle this.  He was the Captain of the Atlas. He thought could do it, just like the Callum Astro in his books.  But Callum got to do fun, cool things, and Shiro was supposed to sit around and make lunch.

His hands shook and his vision blurred with tears.  "I hate you."

Sam stilled.

Satisfaction filled Shiro.  Good. Sam had hurt him first, and this was how Shiro made it even.  Made himself equal. "I  _ hate _ you," Shiro repeated, louder this time. "Who even are you?  You're not my grandfather, and you're not my friend. None of you are!  You're a bunch of strangers who won't let me do anything and expect me to be happy about it.  Why should I listen to you, anyway?"

"Because—" Sam's voice came out jagged, like Shiro had cut right through him.  "Because we care about you. I want you safe, but I also want everyone else on the ship to be safe too."

No, Sam cared about the older Shiro.  He didn't know him now. 

The tears burned behind his eyes, but Shiro's temper burned more powerfully.  "It's all your fault, not mine! I just wanted to fly! If you weren't mean for no reason, none of this would have happened!"  He jabbed his metal hand toward Sam, baring his teeth.

Sam went dangerously still.

"Well, that's out of the question.  No one is going to be flying anymore.  Because someone turned off the gravity in the hangars," Sam's eyes flashed furiously, and he seemed to grow an extra foot in his anger.  "While the pilots were still inside the room, I might add."

Oh.

Oh, _ no. _

Those big, expensive planes were designed to land just right.  Not to float off the ground and fall back down, especially not when there might be people underneath.

Shiro's stomach crashed to his feet as he imagined Griffin or Rizavi or Kinkade or Leifsdottir under their ship when it came back down.

It wasn't just anonymous officers anymore. It was people who had been nice to him, who showed him their planes and let him hang out.  They might be hurt. They might be really hurt.

Arms dropping, Shiro stared up at Sam in dismay.

Sam stared back, expression harder than it had been the whole conversation.  Before, Shiro realized, he'd softened the blow and tried to be gentler. Now, he wasn't bothering.

"You're going to stay in this room," Sam said coldly.  "You're going to think about what you've done, while I go see what's broken and if anyone got hurt.  And every single person that goes to the infirmary, you're going to apologize to personally."

Shiro swallowed hard.  He didn't even nod. He just continued to stare at Sam and tried to contain the awful, sickly feelings inside him.  His hands shook at his side.

When there was no response, Sam shook his head, clearly disappointed.  "Atlas," he said, voice rising. "I hope you'll exercise better judgement in the future.  I understand you're used to listening to Shiro, but as long as he's this age, there need to be limits.  If you won't enforce them, I'll figure out another solution."

There was guilty, aching silence from Atlas.

"She didn't do anything wrong," Shiro blurted, then bit his lip when Sam's cold, angry eyes snapped back onto him.  "She said it would affect the whole ship. I told her to do it anyway."

Sam considered Shiro, head tilted and eyes narrowed.  "We'll discuss this further later. For now, you'll stay there until I get you.  Atlas, Shiro is allowed access to his quarters and nothing else."

_ Yes, Commander. _

Sam didn't seem to hear that, but he took a deep breath and turned.  Without another word, the door shut firmly behind him. It couldn't be slammed, but it felt like it.

Shiro crashed back down onto the rug, covering his face with both hands.  Now that Sam was gone, the tears ran freely down his cheeks.

He hadn't wanted this.  He hadn't wanted any of this.  From waking up here to hurting the MFE pilots, Shiro hadn't meant for any of this to happen.

"It's not fair," he managed around his sniffles.  

_ I'm sorry, Captain, _ Atlas said.  _  I should not have suggested the gravity.  I just didn't want you to be sad. I don't want you to be sad now. _

Well, Shiro was sad anyway.  He curled up against the front of the couch, forehead to his knees as he tried to press the tears away. 

He wanted to be home.  He wanted to wake up and go to his grandfather, who would be fine, and tell him about his weird dream.  Grandfather would bundle him up in a blanket and make him a warm drink and let him get out the whole story, telling Shiro he had such a strange imagination.  He'd probably go find the Callum Astro novel from under Shiro's pillow and smack him playfully on the shoulder with it, declaring it the problem. After the drink, he'd tuck Shiro in and tell him that he was silly, but that he loved Shiro anyway.

But when Shiro opened his eyes, he saw the strange, floating metal hand.

_ I'm sorry,  _ Atlas repeated, more desperately this time. _  I am very sorry.  How do I help? Don't cry, Captain. _

"Did we hurt anybody?"

There was a long silence _.  I do not know the full extent.  Most rooms sustained minor damage.  Some crew members fell badly or were impacted by equipment.  But until they report to the infirmary, I cannot say precisely what injuries have been sustained. _

Shiro had messed up.  He'd thought he could be Captain just as well as all the grown-ups, but he'd messed it all up.

No wonder everyone wanted the older version of him back.  He probably wouldn't have done this. Right?

_ It is not something I discussed with you at your full age _ , Atlas admitted.   _ It is a functionality that could be useful in specific context.  But I don't believe you would have asked me to do so in this context as an adult, no. _

Exactly.

Curling up further, Shiro gave into the tears.

***

Eventually, Shiro cried himself into an uneasy doze.  He woke on the floor, still curled into a ball against the front of the couch.  When he straightened up, his neck and back ached from the bad position.

At first, he had no idea where he was.  The angle was unfamiliar, and the chaos and just-off furniture made the whole room seem alien.  Even walking in the first time, hadn't felt like he was in a stranger's space. Until now.

Shiro pushed himself up and wiped under his achy eyes.  If he left his regular room like this, he knew he'd be in huge trouble with his grandfather.  He didn't really like mess anyway, and he was willing to bet that the older version of him was the same.  Before Shiro had turned off the gravity, everything had been in nice, clean order, befitting a Captain.

For a moment, Shiro indulged himself in another round of morose self pity.  No wonder everybody wanted the adult one back. They were all probably so mad at him, especially if people got hurt.

But rather than curl up for a second round of crying, Shiro shook his head.  He'd already made a fuss. He didn't want to keep crying like a baby anymore.  It was time to clean up his messes.

This time, literally.

The worst kind of cleaning.

Shiro huffed and started to collect everything that had fallen on the floor.  Other than the remains of his sandwich, most of it was impersonal and utilitarian.  There were lots and lots of important looking papers, all of which were out of order.  Shiro tried to read them to put them back properly, but there were so many big words and official sounding terms that he ended up just tossing them in a big pile.  Someone else would have to get those straightened up. 

Then, Shiro picked up the huge variety of pens and pencils from where they'd all been strewn around the room.  They all went back into a thankfully intact mug that had landed back on the desk. The side read 'I like my coffee like I like my paladin.'  He puzzled over that for a minute, then gave it up as a future joke, or maybe an adult one. 

From there, Shiro collected the books that had managed to tumble free of the case.  At first, he just picked them up. But as Shiro started to read the covers to put them back in their proper places, he realized he recognized them.  _  Soaring around Saturn through Mars Mayhem, books 6-10. _

It was a compilation of Callum Astro books.  Several of them were. The covers weren't the colorful pictures that Shiro was used to, but instead simple, dyed fabric, the titles inlaid in metallic ink.  They looked like boring adult books, but they were really a kiddie adventure series.

Taking the first book ( _ Takeoff Troubles through Evening on Europa, books 1-5 _ ) off the shelf, Shiro plopped down and flipped it open.  The cover page had ink peeking through from the other side, so he flipped it over.

Written in familiar, careful handwriting, was 'Takashi— I'm so proud of all you've accomplished.  But do not forget why you work so hard and to appreciate the world around you. And do not let your instructors at the Garrison find books under your pillows like I did.'

It was unsigned, but Shiro knew exactly who it was from.

It was, perhaps, the first sign of himself that Shiro had found in these rooms.

Turning around, Shiro hugged the book to his chest and looked over the room, mess and all.  Like the arm, like his hair, like the weird scar over his nose, this place felt normal. But now Shiro could actually see it as his home, and not just a place where another version of him slept at night.

For the first time, the nearly mythical figure of ‘Shiro the Captain’ felt like  _ him. _

"I'm sorry for messing it up," he said, looking up at the ceiling.  There was no way for the big version of him to hear, of course, but it still felt right.  "Your job and your stuff."

There was no answer, of course.

Until there was.  _  I can help,  _ Atlas offered quietly.  _  I know where everything belongs, if you have questions. _

No, Shiro was going to do this himself.  Maybe Atlas had turned off the gravity, but it had been his decision because he was mad at Sam.  So it was his job to put everything to rights.

Resolved anew, Shiro put the Callum Astro book back, then went back to work.

With the books and desk items out of the way, the living room section was pretty much finished.  Some of the furniture would need to be shifted around, but that wasn't going to be Shiro's job. He was just too small right now.  A peek into the bedroom just showed a few clothes from the closet had escaped, and those were easy enough to put back. The bathroom was slightly more complicated, if only because the toothbrush probably shouldn't be used after being on the floor.  He put it aside to clean later, and got everything else back to their rightful spots.

The kitchen was the hardest.  So much of the cabinets had shifted.  Shiro had to be careful to make sure nothing else fell out.  The mug had luckily broken into only about half a dozen pieces, so it was easy enough to collect those up.  As far as he could tell, there weren't any fragments, so he just avoided touching the edges until he could throw the pieces away.

By the end, the rooms weren't perfect, but they were much better than they had been.

Then, Shiro was left with nothing much to do.

Sam still hadn't come back yet.  

Which meant Shiro was still very grounded.

Flopping down on the couch yet, Shiro stared up at the ceiling.  "What time is it, Atlas?"

_ It is 14:36, Captain. _

Sandwiches had been around lunch, and Shiro had turned off the gravity a little after that.  So it had been around two hours since then. Maybe a little less. It probably took a long time for Sam to check every room and every person for harm, so it made sense that he wasn't back.

Even so, Shiro's stomach flipped, and not just because he'd never had the rest of his sandwich or his chips.  How long was Sam going to leave him here for? Was it because he was so busy and he had just forgotten where Shiro was?  Or maybe he was so mad that he still wanted Shiro out of the way where he didn't have to think about him. Or worse, everyone on the ship was mad at him, and they all wanted him to stay away.

_ That is not true.  The crew loves you, Captain. _

Shiro swallowed hard and stared at the tidied room.

Atlas went quiet and still.  After letting Shiro breathe for a minute, she spoke again.  _  If you are worried, I can tell you where Commander Holt is now. _

Oh, yes.  That would-

Wait, no.  Shiro abusing Atlas' abilities was what got him in trouble in the first place.  He wasn't going to do that again and get in even more trouble. 

What Shiro needed was to make everything right, not to make the same mistakes over again.  But how was he supposed to do that if he was trapped in these rooms? There had to be something better he could be doing.  Like cleaning up the mess everywhere else, too. Or—

Or doing what Sam had said and apologizing to everyone in the infirmary.

That was the right thing to do.  Not even because he'd been told to, but because Shiro owed them all.  He'd been the one to hurt them, and the very least he could do was try and speak with them and make amends.  

All this time, Shiro had wanted the prestige and fun of being Captain, and none of the responsibility or downsides.  He'd wanted to boss everyone around and make them listen to him, without thinking about their safety in the face of his wants.  That wasn't what a Captain did. Sam had said the older version of him made sure everyone was at their best.

Shiro had failed his crew, and he'd failed his older self.

It wasn't something he liked to think about himself.  It made him sound like a brat or a bully. So he was going to change that.

Which meant getting to the infirmary.

Which meant leaving his rooms.

Shiro hopped up to his feet and tried the console by his door.  It had a space for a hand print, but it wouldn't open for him. Despite all the times he'd activated it before, now it flashed red.

"Atlas?"

_ Commander Holt said you only have access to your rooms,  _ Atlas said. _  I do not want to cause you more trouble.  You are to stay here. _

But this was more important than that!  It wasn't just that Shiro was bored or annoyed or angry.  He had a responsibility. And if he left everyone alone for hours, they had lots of time to think about how angry they were at Shiro.  They'd probably think that about him even if he was big again, too.

Bad enough Shiro had broken the mug.  He didn't want to break his older self's job.

Resting his head on the door, Shiro focused on that desperation, that need to do better, and pushed it all down toward Atlas.  "Please. I'll be in trouble. Sam might be mad. But this is the right thing to do."

There was a pause.

Then the door moved under Shiro's head.

Staring at the open hallway, Shiro's stomach flipped with nerves.  But he steeled himself, shoulders back. "Thank you, Atlas."

_ You are welcome, Captain.  _  She didn't sound nervous anymore.  Instead, she seemed proud.

With that bolstering him, Shiro started weaving down the hallways, using his perfect mental map to find his way through.  It only took a couple of minutes to get to the infirmary. The door had been left open, and Shiro could already see that it was far busier than when he'd woken up yesterday.

Hesitating, Shiro stood back from the door, his stomach trying to crawl up out his throat.  All these people had very good reasons to be angry with him, and he was about to walk into the room to face them.

Standing out here and hiding wasn't solving anything, though.  He couldn't avoid everyone forever, especially now that he was out of his room. So Shiro took a deep breath and stepped inside.

In the chaos, almost no one noticed the silent ten year old entering the room.  Shiro recognized the small form of Doctor Fraiser speaking seriously to two crew members by the far well.  Her back was to him, and both of them were deeply focused on her. Several more personnel were scattered throughout the room.  About two-thirds were laying or sitting on cots, while the rest seemed to be visiting to help the injured.

"Didn't expect to see you around so quickly."

Shiro froze, then turned to face the familiar voice.  Rizavi stood next to one cot, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed.  Griffin and Kinkade both sat in front of her, facing a bed.

A bed that contained Leifsdottir.

All four of them were ruffled.  Rizavi's hair was a tangled mass in her ponytail, and Kinkade had a dark red mark up the side of his chin.  Leifsdottir's arm was wrapped from her wrist up in what was obviously meant to be a cast.

Shiro slumped and bit his bottom lip, biting back a strangled noise.  It was one thing to know they'd been in the their hangar when the gravity had gone off, but it was another to see it.  He wrapped his arms around his chest like he could hold all the sick feelings inside, then walked forward. "I wanted-"  His voice cracked. "I wanted to check in on everybody. And say I'm sorry. That's from earlier?"

Holding up her arm as if inspecting the cast, Leifdottir nodded.  "The radial bone was broken in two places, and the ulna was cracked."  At Shiro's horrified expression, she dropped her arm. "When gravity was restored, I was over my plane to get it angled correctly.  It landed well. I did not."

"Does it hurt?"

"Yes."

Kinkade snorted, his eyes darting to Leifsdottir.

"I'm sorry."  Shiro swallowed hard, fighting to speak around the lump in his throat.  "I'm really sorry. I didn't know what it would do to the ship or to everyone."

Leifsdottir considered him, her eyes sharp.  It felt like she was looking at each separate molecule of him.  "I appreciate the apology. I do not believe you were malicious when you took that action.  Please be more careful with Atlas' abilities in the future."

Nodding vigorously, Shiro clasped his hands together.  "I will," he promised. "I really will."

"Your apology is accepted, then."  Leifsdottir settled back down, but then tilted her head.  "Accepted, pending approval of time off."

Shiro paused, unsure.  "I don't know if I can do that until I'm older again," he admitted.  "But I don't think I'd make you work if you're hurt. Would I?"

"She's teasing you, kid," Rizavi said.

"I am not.  I am extorting him for extra vacation days."

Rizavi's brows rose, and she finally cracked a smile.  "Oh! Then carry on, then."

Turning to face the other three, Shiro took a deep breath.  Lefisdottir's relatively easy acceptance made him more confident, but his hands still shook as he started again.  "I'm also sorry to you guys. I really didn't mean to hurt anybody." He faced Kinkade. "Is your camera okay?"

Kinkade stilled, seeming surprised that Shiro would ask after it.  He dug until his bag and pulled out his video camera, which seemed perfectly intact.

"Good."  Shiro relaxed just a bit.  Maybe it was a silly thing to worry about, considering the very real human injury around him, but Kinkade clearly cared about his camera.  It would have been awful if it had been smashed in the chaos. He doubted those were inexpensive.

Looking him over, Kinkade gave a nod.  "Alright." He said, and that was all.

Was that good or bad?

But Kinkade started to fiddle with his camera again, not even looking up at Shiro.  On the other hand, he didn't seem angry, so maybe it was okay?

Shiro looked up at Rizavi in askance, since she was usually the one to explain weird behavior to him.  The side of her lips quirked up as she watched, which was probably a good sign.

"It was pretty brave of you to come here to apologize," Rizavi said.  "I like bravery. I might even like zero G, if it wasn't a surprise. So, you're off the hook with me on two conditions."  She held up one finger. "First is that we set up localized, controlled zero G training. There's gotta be a way to keep it in one room, and I want to try it for real."  A second finger. "The other is that you let me be the one to test the Atlas-controlled MFE."

Shiro goggled up at her.  "Sam said we weren't allowed to do that."

Rizavi arched a brow at him. "No, he said ten year olds don't get to be test subjects.  Which is, you know, not a bad policy. But I'm not ten. Therefore, I get to test it. You got it?"

"Got it."  Shiro was really going to have to make a list at some point.

_ I will keep track, Captain. _

Oh, okay.  Good. That helped.  

Finally, Shiro turned to face Griffin, who still hadn't said a word.  

"Okay," Griffin said, taking a deep breath.  He pointed to the space next to his chair. "Come here.  We're going to have a talk."

Uh-oh.  Shiro scampered over, his heart clenching.  He stood where Griffin indicated, fighting the urge to duck his head.

"You are extremely lucky," Griffin said.  "You're lucky that Ina was on top of her ship instead of under it.  You're lucky that she landed on her arm and not on her head. You're lucky that all that happened was that her arm broke.  Do you understand that?"

Shiro closed his eyes to fight back tears and nodded.  "I do." It was hard to wrap his head around the fact that one thoughtless decision could have killed someone.  Could have killed someone who was nothing but nice and helpful to him over the past day.

"I've known Ina for longer than anyone outside of my family," Griffin said, his voice still hard.  All this time, he'd seemed surprisingly harmless, with his neatly combed hair and respect for the rules.  But right now his jaw was set and his shoulders were straight. He was equal parts passionate and intimidating.  "She forgives you, but I'm not ready to yet. Maybe not for a while. You hurt my closest friend."

This time, the tears built in Shiro's tears, clouding his vision.  "I'm sorry. To everyone."

"I know you are.  But that doesn't change things."  Griffin took a deep breath, then leaned back again.  "Thank you for your apology. If you're still this age when Ina is better, we'll talk again."

As much as Shiro wanted to protest, that was reasonable.  He wasn't owed forgiveness, even if he tried his best to apologize and make things right.  "Okay."

Griffin nodded to him, then gestured his head back toward the rest of the room.  By now, more than one set of eyes was on Shiro. "Go on. You've got more apologies to make."

Wincing, Shiro nodded.  "Everyone knows, then?"

"Sam told the bridge crew, and news travels fast," Rizavi said, shrugging against the wall.  "So, yup. Good luck with that."

Turning to face all the other people in the room, Shiro braced himself.

Then he got to work.

***

It took well over an hour for Shiro to talk to everyone hurt.  There was everyone who was already there, and there were also a stream of new injuries as he tried to work through everyone.  Most of the crew were like Leifsdottir and relatively understanding that it was a thoughtless accident. Others were like Griffin, and wanted to impress upon him the full impact of his actions.

By the end, Shiro was a strange mixture of relieved, exhausted, and shaking.  It was over, and no one seemed like they were going to quit or hate him even when he was older, which was good.  But it had been a long roller coaster of a day, and his short doze wasn't enough to make up for that.

Finally, almost all of the crew had left the room.  Other than one or two minor concussions that would need watching, everyone was treated and put in a cast and was able to spend the night in their own quarters.  Shiro was left in the far quieter infirmary, leaning against the wall.

The click-clack of heels caught his attention.  Shiro picked his head up and turned to look at Doctor Fraiser.  "Oh," he murmured, then pushed himself off the wall. "I made a lot of work for you today. I'm sorry."

"You certainly did," Doctor Fraiser said.  "But I think you've done enough apologizing for now.  I was actually going to tell you to take a seat. We should do a test to make sure everything still looks normal with you."

On one hand, Shiro didn't really want to be poked and prodded anymore.   He was so tired, from his earlier frustrations to the fight with Sam to now.  But sitting was good, and he didn't want to find out something was wrong and they'd missed it.  So he climbed into one of the chairs and slumped back.

Doctor Fraiser held up a strange little device with a light on the front.  She ran it over him and looked at the screen, nodding. "Alright. I'm going to check your pulse now, okay?"  She waited until Shiro looked and nodded before putting her fingers on the side of his throat and started to count, eyes on the computer clock.

Slumping back, Shiro let it all happen, eyes heavily lidded.  "I didn't do my hand exercises today," he admitted, a hint slurred.  "I'm sorry."

"That's alright.  You had a busy day.  Besides, you don't have to worry about those."  Doctor Fraiser picked up the device again and hummed over the results.

Shiro blinked at her, not understanding why.  But it was probably a future thing. Maybe they had pills to fix it or something.  Whatever the issue, that was for older Shiro to deal with. Instead, he closed his eyes and let his head droop.  

Time passed, where the doctor probably kept running tests, but apparently didn't feel the need to share any of it.  Her heels clacked around him, walking away then coming back. 

Then, a hand slid into his hair.  Shiro startled, eyes flashing open, and he automatically smacked the arm away.  He was still tired, but now his heart pounded, and he flinched back like he expected a blow in return.

Doctor Fraiser stood in front of him, hand still in the air.  "Oh," she said, soft and sad. "I didn't mean to startle you, Captain. I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry for hitting you."  Apparently there was no end to the apologies, now.  Shiro felt like he was just saying that over and over, from now until forever.  Like he'd forgotten how to say anything else. His body still thrummed with tension, even though he didn't know why.  It was like he'd woken up to a monster standing over him, not a perfectly nice doctor. But he wanted to hit and run and hide.

"Don't be sorry, I shouldn't have touched you when you weren't ready."  She gave a sheepish smile. "It wasn't even for a good reason. You just reminded me of when my daughter used to fall asleep in her chair."

Shiro blinked in surprise.  "You have a daughter?"

"Yes.  Cassandra.  She's away in college now, so quite a bit older than you.  But she was just a little younger than you when she was adopted."  Doctor Fraiser smiled, but her eyes were focused just a little past Shiro at the wall.  "She'd get far too excited about something and keep at it until she literally fell asleep wherever she was.  Used to drive me crazy."

Shiro bit back a yawn and tried to pay attention, but his energy was rapidly draining to nothing.  He wasn't sure if this was just a nice story, or if there was a point she was trying to make.

Noticing him flagging, Doctor Fraiser shook her head.  "Nevermind, sorry. Do you think you can get back to your rooms?   Everything looks good, but I think I'm going to prescribe you a good night's sleep anyway."

Honestly, that sounded good to Shiro.  "Yeah. I can do that." He hopped off the chair and started for the door.

"One more thing, Captain."  Doctor Fraiser waited for Shiro to look before continuing.  "It's possible you'll have some... strange dreams. If you feel strangely tense or scared, or if you feel like something is wrong, or if you have nightmares, I want you to tell me.  Okay?"

That was weird.  Shiro wrinkled his nose as he looked up at her.  "I can handle a bad dream," he said. "I've had nightmares before."  He wasn't some little kid that needed to crawl into his guardian's bed because of a silly dream.

"It's something from the future," Doctor Fraiser said.  "I think you'll be okay, but just in case. We'll talk about it more soon, but you need sleep right now, so that'll be tomorrow."

Fine, whatever, Shiro nodded.  He felt wobbly on his feet, like he was going to vibrate himself to pieces and sleep like that.  Whatever made her happy so he could go.

Doctor Fraiser sighed and waved him off.  "Alright, off you go, then."

Good.  "Thank you, Doctor."  With that, Shiro ducked out before she could change her mind again.

But despite his exhaustion, the kernel of tension in Shiro's stomach wouldn't go away.  A tremble continued to run through his bones, like he had a bad chill. After all the bad feelings of the day, he couldn't seem to just put it away and go to sleep.

So rather than head right to his rooms as he should, Shiro let his feet wander.  There was a purpose to his strides, and he took turns without thinking about why.

It wasn't until he came to a big pair of double doors that Atlas spoke. _  You don't need to go this way, Captain. _

No, he didn't need to.  But Shiro had a vague idea what was on the other side, and he wanted to see.  He wanted to chase the feeling of safety he knew was on the other side.

When he touched, the doors hesitated a moment.  But they opened, if more reluctantly than normal.

Inside, the five lions of Voltron loomed over him.

Shiro stumbled through, eyes wide.  His steps were clumsy, but he couldn't stop an excited grin from spreading over his face.  These were alien spaceships, and they looked like cool lions. They were smaller than he'd expected, but they still towered over him, giant beasts of metal and color.

Color.

Shiro looked down at his uniform top, at the stark, stately black.  

Then he looked up at the lion against the farthest wall.  The Black Lion, whose head was facing right at him.

Whose eyes lit up as Shiro came closer.

The great head descended slowly, until it was level with the floor.  Slowly, the metal maw parted, revealing a walkway. Just one of the teeth was easily bigger than Shiro's whole body.

It should have been odd.  Frightening, even. But Shiro still smiled as he walked inside and up the ramp, without ever feeling awkward or out of place.  The top area was a cockpit, which lit up in purple lights as he approached.

Shiro settled down in the pilot's chair.  His feet dangled, making him feel even smaller.  But more than that, he felt safe.

_ You can feel safe with me, Captain,  _ Atlas insisted, louder now.   _ There's no need to be here.  You should go back to your rooms before Commander Holt returns. _

Probably.  But it felt nice here.  The awe at the ships overwhelmed some of his nervous energy. So Shiro would just rest here, just for a minute.  That was okay. The lion had invited him in, so this couldn't be a bad thing.

With that, Shiro closed his eyes.

And opened them to a purple, starry sky.

Slowly, Shiro stood.  He was still tired, but not in a way that made him physically ache again.  In fact, he didn't feel like anything. He just was, except for his mind.

The world around him didn't shift or change.  The stars in the distance glimmered softly, and there was a huge, dark hole, like an eclipse gone strange.  Despite the stillness, Shiro still got the creeping feeling of something changing. He whirled in place-

And promptly fell on his ass when he saw the towering metal lion right behind him.

The impression of laughter echoed through him.  It was distant, like he was hearing it from all the way down a long hallway.

The lion's glowing eyes focused on him.

"Is that you?" Shiro asked, pushing himself back up to his feet.

_ Yes. _

Oh.

Shiro looked down at the metal claws, then up to the tips of the golden ears.  It was a long way to go. "Um. Hello."

_ Hello,  _ the lion replied, faintly amused.   _ I did not expect to see you here again after last time. _

Last time?  What happened last time?  It had to be a future thing, but Shiro's knowledge wasn't that thorough.  Just a sense of normalcy, or maybe faint suggestions. The rest he was figuring out as he went.  "I'm sorry," he finally said. "Do you need me to go? I didn't know I wasn't supposed to be here."

_ Yes,  _ Atlas said immediately.  For the first time, there was a vibration to go with the voice, as if she was physically speaking.  There still wasn't sound to hear, but it shook through Shiro like a tuning fork.  _ We are not supposed to be here.  This is no longer your place. We should leave. _

The lion let out a rumble so loud it nearly knocked Shiro right back off his feet.   _ You are welcome, my paladin.  You do not need to worry. You have always had a place here, and you always will.   _

This time, Atlas brightened indignantly.   _ Why should he?  You replaced him! _

_ It was safest. _

Shiro cleared his throat.  Both voices went obligingly silent, letting him speak.  "I don't know what's going on," he admitted. "Could you please tell me what happened last time?"

The lion ducked their head down, like when they'd let Shiro in their maw.   _ You were part of me for a period of time.  You lived here in spirit, much as I do.  _

_ He was trapped,  _ Atlas snapped.   _ He could be trapped again if he stays here. _

What?  Shiro could be trapped?  Backing up nervously, Shiro looked to the lion, then at the sky, as if that was where Atlas was.  

Black's wings snapped out, and their eyes flared brightly.  _  That was not my doing, nor would it happen now.  Do not lie to scare him. _

There was a huff.   _ It's not a lie.  I would never lie to my Captain. _

_ Would you not? _

Atlas went silent.

Frowning, Shiro finally set his shoulders and turned to the Black Lion.  "What do you mean? Atlas is my friend. She loves me."

_ She is a child, as you are now.  And children are prone to mistakes, especially because of their emotions. _

Shiro flinched and ducked his head.  He couldn't deny that, not when he'd spent the entire afternoon making up for his own bad choices.  "Atlas? What's going on?"

Silence.

Swallowing hard, Shiro looked up at the purple sky again.  "I won't be mad, Atlas. But if you made a mistake, we have to make up for it.  I'll help you, but we have to be good people."

_ I am not a person,  _ Atlas insisted, but it was sulky.  _  I am a ship. _

Shiro only crossed his arms stubbornly.

There wasn't a sigh, because that required breath.  But Atlas gave the closest version she could.  _  I do not think it was a mistake.  But it is perhaps something I should have chosen more carefully, or spoken to you about before I took action.  Please understand that, when you are older, you put others before yourself. I admire this, and my desire to protect and work with the crew is a reflection of that.  However, my first priority is to make sure you are safe and content. _

Shiro's brow furrowed.  He looked around, then over to the Black Lion, as if the unchanging metal face could give him any clues what Atlas was talking about.  "Um, that doesn't sound bad to me. I like that you're on my side. But if you did something, you probably should have told older me about it.  What did you do?"

There was a silence.

Then—

Shiro rubbed over the bridge of his nose and pushed away from his desk.  His room's lights didn't follow the usual night cycle, having long since been overrode to he could work.  So long as they were on Earth, his job had switched to a more paperwork-oriented schedule. Shiro couldn't pretend he didn't miss working with the coalition leaders and going into battle, but that wasn't going to happen again until they got Atlas working properly.

The sooner he got this all done, the better.

_ You will work better if you are properly rested,  _ Atlas said.  _  Humans require eight hours of sleep for best results.  If you go to bed right now, you will only get- _

Shaking his head, Shiro laughed.  "No, Atlas, I'm fine. I don't need that much sleep.  Never have."

_ That does not make me feel better, _ Atlas said.  

"Sorry, but it's true.  I don't think I've slept that much since I was a kid."  Shiro rolled his shoulders, even the one that was metal.  Then he leaned backward, bending his spine until it cracked.  "Ahh, better. See? I'm stretching. Breaks. I listen to you."

_ Not enough. _

Shiro shrugged, still smiling softly.  "I appreciate that you try. But this is good.  I still feel so much better." He looked down at his right hand, lips curling up as he worked the fingers.  "Younger, even."

Atlas paused, as if confused.   _ You are not old.  The average human lives to several times your age.   _

"Yes, well, I'm not the average human.  I grew up a little faster than normal." He dropped his hand and went back to stretching, bending his knees up to his chest and holding them there.  "It's better now, but I'm still adjusting, that's all."

Atlas was thoughtfully silent.   _ Do you miss being younger, Captain? _

Pausing, Shiro blinked at the floor.  "Huh. I haven't thought about it much."  He looked over at his bookshelf, and the collection on the middle shelf.  He hadn't cracked open any of them in years. He was lucky that Keith had taken the crate with his supplies when he was declared dead, and even luckier that he hadn't opened it.  All of it stayed tightly sealed against the elements, even in the desert. "I suppose so, at times. It was certainly less complicated."

Atlas said nothing in response.

Shiro waited, head tilted.  But when he got only silence, he shrugged it off.  "Alright, back to work. Start a timer for one hour, and tell me when it passes, alright?  We'll see if I'm at a good stopping point, then."

_ Yes, Captain. _

Shiro sat back down at his desk and blinked—

—-and blinked, staring at the purple landscape again.

Shiro jolted and stumbled.  That hadn't been his memory!  Or, it had, but not now. It wasn't anything he'd done as a ten year old.  That was adult Shiro, with his big hands and lower voice.

As the shock of the memory passed, Shiro was able to focus on the content of it.  He replayed the conversation over, taking in the little details (he was so tall when he was older!).

It didn't take long for him to figure out what Atlas meant.

"You did this on purpose," Shiro said slowly.  He looked down at his hands, so much smaller than in the memory.  "The energy that did this. It was from you, and it wasn't an accident I was fixing.  You tricked older me."

_ It did not harm you.  He wanted to be younger again. _

"That's not what he meant!"  Shiro sat down hard, legs splayed out in front of him.  "You can't just do that to somebody!"

Atlas stayed silent, a mixture of stubborn and guilty.

"Can you fix it?  Pidge and Allura and everybody are working really hard to make me older again.  Am I going to be little forever?" Shiro's eyes grew wide. "Will you let me age?  Or will you keep making me younger again?"

_ No!   _ Atlas surged forward desperately, until the presence of her felt like it was all around him.   _ No, I won't do that!  I can change you back.  But there's nothing to fix.  You are Captain at all ages, and you are still so good.  But now you can rest and have fun! _

Except Shiro couldn't have fun, because it was too dangerous.  He still didn't understand why, but he wasn't about to kick up a fuss after the last time had gone so badly.

_ It did not go as I planned,  _ Atlas admitted.   _ But I wanted you to be happy and healthy.  That was all. _

Well, Shiro was tired, and heart sore, and so very confused.  He scrubbed over his face with both hands. "Everyone misses older me," he said.  "They need him more than they need me. He's important."

_ You are important, _ Atlas insisted, voice hard.   _ You are important in all ways, including this.  I should not have done this without asking, but I knew you would have said no simply because of your work. _

The Black Lion rumbled again.   _ And you should have respected his choice. _

_ Like you did when you snatched him up?  _  Atlas shot back.

_ I did so to save him, in the way that I could.  It was painful for a time, but he survived, as he wished he could.  My actions are my own, and I have paid for them in losing my second paladin.  It does not excuse your choices. _

Atlas huffed.

"Are you sorry?"

There was a pause.

Shiro pushed himself to his feet.  "You confused everyone. You gave people more work.  You didn't ask my permission. Are you sorry?"

The pause continued.  Then, finally, Atlas said,  _ Yes, I am sorry for that. _

"Then say it."  Shiro balled up his hands at his side.  "It's important. I did it, because it's the right thing to do.  Now you have to. I want you to apologize to me, and to everyone, and then to older me."

Atlas seemed to slump.  Y _ ou wish to go back?  You could be like this.  The others would adapt. _

Would they?  Sam had said he didn't want a ten year old to be Captain.  That would be even worse if they were going to fight, wouldn't it?  Life wasn't like Shiro's novels, as much as he'd wanted it to be. When Callum Astro did something fun, there wasn't consequences.  It was just cool. Shiro wanted to believe he could be a great Captain, but he was a kid. He made mistakes. He didn't think things through.  He was going to try, but he was probably going to mess up again. He didn't have the experience to realize when things might go wrong.

But the older version of him did.

Atlas needed a Captain.  As he was, Shiro wasn't that.  But he could be. And the older version of him was still ten year old Shiro, with just more years on top.  The books proved that. The others proved that. They cared for him, even at this age. 

Things couldn’t stay as they were.

"Yes.  I want to go back.  I want to be older again."

Finally, Atlas deflated.   _ Oh.  Yes, I am sorry.  I did not mean to harm you, Captain. _

"You just didn't think it through?"  Shiro smiled and nodded. "I know. Me too.  We're going to do better next time."

An alien happiness bubbled up in Shiro's chest.   _ Yes.  We will. _  Another pause.  _ Do I have to change you back now?  I need to build up the energy again. _

Well, no, maybe not this second.  Shiro could be younger for a little while more.  But not for much longer, if they wanted to go back out into space.  

_ One day would be best to draw and store excess energy without affecting other systems. _

That was probably fast enough.  Shiro nodded. "Okay. That'll do.  Thank you for your apology. I forgive you, but you still have to apologize to everyone else.

At that, Atlas went sulky again.  But she didn't argue, which was enough.

Shiro turned to the Black Lion.  "Thank you for helping. How did you know that Atlas made me younger?"

_ There was a rumbling laugh.  I see in more ways than your eyes can, little human. _

Oh.  That was kind of weird.

Black laughed again.

Shiro reached out and put his hand on the metal nose.  "You said before that you saved me, right? Even if it hurt for a little while, I think older me would be glad to be alive.  He gets to be Captain and fly in Atlas and stop bad guys. That's what I want to do, so I think he's happy.

The distant, echoing bond with Black seemed to shiver.  _  I am glad to hear that.  Now, I would invite you to stay and rest, but I do not think you are going to get that opportunity. _

What?  Why no-

 

"Shiro!"  The name echoed loudly in the space.

Two glimmers appeared in front of Shiro.  They moved forward, forming into hands that grasped onto either of Shiro's shoulders.  Then they shook him, gentle but insistent.

Crying out, Shiro flailed instinctively.  His eyes flew open.

He was in the pilot's chair again, the lights of the console still on.  But this time, Keith was in the cockpit with him, hands on either of Shiro's shoulders.  

"There you are," Keith breathed.  "You freaked everyone out. Commander Holt just about went nuts trying to find you."

Oh, right.  Shiro was supposed to be in his rooms.  "Is he mad?" He rubbed under his eyes, trying to blink away the image of the strange, purple place.  "I know he told me to stay, but I was supposed to apologize to everyone at the infirmary. That's all I did, I swear."

Keith's brows rose.  "Frankly, I don't care if you went and played video games in Pidge's room.  I'm just glad we found you. You okay?" His eyes swept over the room, and his hands tightened on Shiro's shoulder.

Well, Shiro had been trapped inside the Black Lion, apparently.  Maybe Keith was afraid it would happen again. 

He was worried about Shiro, even though he wasn’t the right age anymore.  Keith cared about him.

They were still friends.

Shiro rocked forward to tug Keith into a hug, which was returned immediately and tightly.  "Yeah, I'm okay. Just tired. I'm ready to go, though."

With one last glance around, Keith nodded.  "Alright.” His voice was just a little rough.  “Let's go." 

Then, without so much as a warning, he put his hands under Shiro's rips and heaved him up.  Despite looking pretty skinny, Keith was easily able to throw him over his shoulders in a fireman's carry.

Shiro let out a shriek of laughter and squirmed, trying to get free.  Except he didn't try too hard, because Keith was pretty high up. That fall wouldn't be fun.  "Hey! Keith!"

"I'm not risking it.  You'll run off again and get in more trouble."

Still giggling, Shiro shook his head but went limp.  "Nuh-uh. I won't."

"Nope.  Not worth the risk."  Keith started back down the ramp and out of the lion.  The eye lights stayed on for several seconds after, so Shiro waved a little goodbye.  As if that was what Black had been waiting for, the eyes went dark.

Shiro sighed but didn't argue.  "Is Sam going to ground me again?"

"Would it work?"

"Probably not.  Atlas likes me best."  He considered. "Are you mad at me?"

Keith was silent for a moment.  "It's a little weird to think you did something that impulsive.  But no, I'm not really mad. You're going to beat yourself up for it, and if you talked to everyone, I think you already got scolded about twenty times over, right?"

Shiro nodded, pushing his head to Keith's shoulder so he could feel it.  "Yeah. You're really not mad?"

"Eh," Keith said.  "It's not good that people got hurt, but I definitely made dumber mistakes when I was older than you.  For worse reasons, too. So I'll let it slide. You did for me."

Oh.  That was kind of nice.  Shiro hid his smile in Keith's shoulder.  "Okay."

"You also carried me around like this when I was being stubborn, so it works out."  Keith tightened his grip on Shiro's ankle. It wasn't enough to hurt. Instead, it was grounding.  "But you still have to face the music."

"Yeah, I know."  Shiro closed his eyes, but he didn't stop smiling.  "That's okay. It was worth it."

In his head, Atlas stirred.

_ Yes,  _ she said.  _  It was worth it. _


	4. Chapter 4

"All that work," Pidge mourned, resting her cheek against the keys of her laptop.  "Hours of worry and effort. And Atlas could undo it at any time."

Shiro watched her mope, his fork still in his mouth.  He reached carefully around Lance with his metal arm to pat her on the shoulder.  "Not any time. She said it'll take her a day." He paused. "And she's very sorry."

In his mind, Atlas said no such thing.  But no one else heard Atlas' voice, so no one needed to know that.

Without looking, Lance reached over and rested his elbow on top of Shiro's head, like he was a new table.  "Hey, at least you're off the hook for fixing it. We won't have to demolecularize him anymore."

Shiro started to squirm, but stilled at the last word.  "Demolecularize?" His eyes darted from Pidge to Allura, his meatloaf turning to ash in his mouth.  "You were going to take me apart?"

"No!  Of course not!"  Allura narrowed her eyes at Lance, who only grinned back, utterly unbothered.  "Nothing of the sort, at least not without being sure there was no other cause, and that all your molecules would certainly go back the same way.  Lance is teasing."

Shiro huffed as well, and jammed his metal fingers under Lance's exposed armpit.  Immediately, he snapped his arm back down, protecting the vulnerable area, and pulled Shiro's floating arm away like an unruly pet.  Holding it by the wrist, he held it up over his head where Shiro couldn't reach. 

Tilting his head, Shiro twitched his shoulder.  The arm snapped back at force, breaking Lance's admittedly loose hold and returning to its place where Shiro's right elbow should have been.

"Alright, you two.  Don't get into too much trouble.  I think we've had enough chaos for one day."  Hunk pointed at them with his fork. "At least, I have.  If there's more shenanigans, I want out."

Keith snorted.  "When has the chaos ever been 'opt-in?’"

"Starting today."

Shaking his head, Keith went back to eating.  He used the fork in his left hand just as well as he did his right, while the other hovered just over Shiro's elbow.

Apparently Shiro's disappearing act had done a number on everyone.  It was another thing he hadn't really thought through, but at least this one hadn't gotten him in nearly as much trouble. At least, he didn't think so.  Shiro had only spoken to Sam over the intercoms since Keith had dragged him back to his rooms for dinner. He was busy supervising all the stuff that had gone wrong during the castle's short anti-gravity stint.

None of the paladins had even looked rumpled.  When Shiro had asked, he'd mostly gotten amusement — apparently they'd spent quite a while in a zero G environment, so the adaption hadn't been difficult for them.  The only casualty they faced was the death of the chips they'd tried to make, when they'd floated up into the heating element or crashed onto the floor of the oven.

It felt like being let off easy.  After all that yelling and scolding, Shiro was just sitting around at his table. He didn't even think he was grounded anymore, if so many people were coming over to play around with him.

Shiro shouldn't be complaining.  He wasn't complaining. But it felt incomplete.

But he also didn't like being in trouble, so he was going to keep his mouth shut.

"Alright, so we have one day left," Lance said.  "What are we going to do for that long?"

"Well, let's clarify first.  Did Atlas mean a full solar rotation?  Or at this time in a 'day.'" Allura pronounced the word 'day' like it didn't sit properly on her tongue.

_ I meant- _

Shiro really hoped Atlas was going to be honest about this, considering they'd just discussed how it was wrong to lie.

There was a pause.   _ I meant twenty-four hours. _

"This time tomorrow," Shiro reported, hiding a smile in his glass of water.

Hunk considered that, running his fork through the rest of his mashed potatoes with clear distaste.  Dinner had come from the commissary rather than Hunk himself, and it seemed he wasn't a fan. "That's not a long time."

"We can skip tomorrow's drills," Keith said, finally picking his head up from his meal.  "Pidge and Allura will probably be setting up to make sure everything goes well, and Doctor Fraiser's going to want to get a look at Shiro before and after.  Missing one round of training won't hurt anyone."

"It might even save us," Pidge muttered.  "Your mom was smiling way too much when she talked about this simulation."

Keith smiled back as well, showing that his canines were just a hint too long.

Shivering, Pidge shook her head.  "Yeah, that's good. But it doesn't leave much time tomorrow for doing fun stuff."

"You don't have to worry about me," Shiro said.  "I can watch myself." He really could. He sometimes got to stay home alone for hours on end, while his grandfather did boring adult chores like went to the bank.  It was fun, even if he didn't get up to anything but reading or watching TV. Maybe he'd take another crack at getting all those papers he'd messed up back in order.  Even if he couldn't get them right, he could at least try to sort them by document.

Hunk frowned at him.  "No way. You got turned into a kid.  If all we did was make sandwiches with you one day, that's a huge waste.  Not happening."

"Agreed.  We have a tiny Shiro!  We have to take advantage."  Lance nodded firmly, though the corner of his lips curled up.

Allura's own lips quirked, but when she met Shiro's eyes, her own were serious.  "I think at times we've all been guilty of allowing your older self to take on too much responsibility, or allow himself to work when he could be having fun.  We'd enjoy the chance to help reverse that now, while we still have the chance."

Oh.  Right.  Allura had been really sad when she realized the older Shiro hadn't told her a lot about being ten, hadn't she?  Shiro didn't know why his older self wouldn't talk about that. But she clearly felt like she had done something wrong, and she was trying to make up for it.

Shiro could respect that.  He was doing the same thing, and he was making sure Atlas did too.  

"Okay," he said.  "But I don't think Sam is going to let us do anything cool."

Pidge gave a toothy grin.  "It wouldn't be the first time that I got away with something under Dad's nose."

Staring back, Shiro shook his head.  The memory of being yelled at was still too raw, since it had only been a few hours.  He didn't want a repeat. It had felt bad to be in so much trouble.

"We can come up with something quiet to do," Keith assured him, finally resting his hand on Shiro's arm.  "Why not do a movie night or whatever?"

"But we can do a movie night any time," Lance said.  "It's not that interesting. Shiro does movie nights when he's grown."

Keith's eyes narrowed.  "Is the point of this just to get Shiro to do cute things while he's too young to catch on?"

Straightening, Shiro scowled at Keith.  "I'm not too young! And I'm not stupid."

"That's absolutely not the point," Allura said, though they way she wouldn't quite meet Keith's eyes was deeply suspicious.  "The point is to make sure Shiro has an engaging and relaxing evening. And one, preferably, which does not create any more chaos."

Hunk looked over the table, then focused on Shiro.  "What do you think? What do you want to do?"

That made Shiro pause.  He hadn't even considered anticipating, not after his last desire caused so much fuss.  "I don't really know what there is to do," he admitted. While he has a perfect map of Atlas' rooms, he doesn't know what's in all of them.  Just their designated function.

_ I could show you. _

Yes, but going through room by room would take forever.  Not worth it.

"Can we play a game?"  Shiro finally asked. "I guess we can watch movies, too, but..."  Shiro had spent plenty of days stuck inside, but he didn't prefer it.  He could watch TV or movies or read a book, but he did that a lot anyway.  This promised to be more interesting, so he wanted to take advantage.

Lance considered, one hand idly rubbing over the back of his neck.  "Games, huh? Do we have any sports equipment? We could take up camp in the training room and play."

Lips pressed thin, Hunk considered.  "We could try, but half that room is a gym.  With loose equipment."

"Oh."  Lance leaned back.  "Maybe not, then."

It was probably a mess, in that case. Or, if it was clean, it might have lots of people with good reasons to be annoyed with Shiro right now.

Great.

"Oh!"  Pidge sat up, her eyes bright.  "We don't need sports. Mom brought all our board games onto the ship.  I can go get some. We can play them here, too. Grab a bunch of blankets and pillows and get comfortable."

Hunk's mouth fell open, then spread into a wide grin.  "Blanket fort.  _ Blanket fort." _

That-

That actually sounded like a lot of fun.  Shiro had tried to make a couple of forts, once or twice with a friend but more often by himself.  The problem they inevitably hit was resources. There were only so many blankets and sheets, or the construction space lacked something to be desired.

But this was Atlas.  If they could make him a custom uniform in less than an hour, they probably have all the blankets he could want.  And he didn't know everything about these paladins, but they were overall pretty smart. If anyone could build the ultimate pillow fort, he was pretty sure it was this group.

Besides, board games are fun.  Shiro has played a few, some back in Japan and some in the US.  He liked winning, and he was pretty sure he could hold his own no matter what they threw at him.

"Yeah," Shiro said, smiling now.  "I'd like that. Atlas? Can we have more blankets?"

_ Of course, Captain. _

"She's going to take care of it," Shiro said, utterly confident in Atlas' ability.  "We can move the furniture out of the way while you go get the games, Pidge."

Pidge gave him a quick salute.  "Aye, aye."

"Half his size and still taking charge," Lance said, a smile curling up his lips.

Keith gave Shiro's hair a quick ruffle.  "No one should be surprised."

"Of course not," Allura agreed, smiling warmly at them both.

Clearly, the adults were all teasing him.  Shiro frowned, trying to work up a proper temper.  But he couldn't. That anger had been what caused so much trouble before, and this is what he wanted.  Not flying, maybe, but being including. Having fun. Not just being placated with sandwiches and helmets and fake respect.

Dinner finished, Shiro did his part to help clean up.  His little kitchen had a personal dishwasher, which Shiro was thankful for.   Then, he did his best to help Allura and Hunk move the couch and table out of the way of the living room.  The pair of them lifted the couch up nearly half a foot before Shiro could even get a grip, but he gamely held onto his corner and shuffled along with them.

The door opened on its own, and a floating platter wafted slowly in.  It bobbed slightly in place, proudly holding up a small mountain of blankets, as well as what looked like a roll of heavy duty tape.

Hunk's eyes lit up.  He put the blankets down on the floor, then pushed down on top of the plate.  It sank, but they the faint lights on the bottom brightened. It rose up, resisting Hunk's force.  "Perfect. Hey, Atlas? Do you have a few more of these?"

_ How many would the Yellow Paladin require? _

"How many?" Shiro translated obediently.

"Um."  Hunk tilted his head, eyes roaming over the room.  "Four smaller ones, if we have them? If not, three more of these."

_ I will send three more,  _ Atlas agreed immediately.

Shiro nodded. "There aren't smaller ones, but the others are coming."

"Great.  That's fantastic."  Hunk smiled widely to himself and started to mutter lowly to himself.  He took one of the blankets and unfolded it like he was measuring how big it was.

Lance snagged another one, snickering at Hunk.  "We've lost him. Ah, well." Then, with one snap of his arms, he unravelled the blanket and draped it over Shiro's head.  "Gotcha!"

"Hey!"  Shiro scrambled against the fabric, even as Lance tried to wrap him up in it.  Eventually he caught hold of an edge and yanked it off, just in time for Lance to scramble away.  "Lance!"

Laughing openly, Lance darted to hide behind Keith, who looked vaguely insulted to be treated like a piece of scenery.  But when he moved to the side, Lance scuttled along to match him. "You looked cold," Lance insisted.

"No, I didn't!"  But Shiro was openly grinning as he chased after, trying to loop around Keith.  But Lance matched him, weaving deftly so he was always on the opposite side of Shiro.  "Get back here!"

"Not very fast at this age, are you?" Lance shot back, grinning with too many teeth.  "Must be those short little legs."

Letting out a battle cry, Shiro pivoted and dove at Lance, arms outstretched.

Only for Lance to step to the side, letting Shiro land heavily on his stomach.  His breath escaped in a whoosh as Shiro groaned, half at the indignity and half at Lance's laughter.

"You okay?" Keith asked, not sounding very worried.  He nudged Shiro with his boot.

Shoving himself to his feet, Shiro shook his head so his bangs weren't in his face.  "Fine." His eyes stayed locked onto Lance, who had chosen Allura as his new cover. "You're going to get it."

"Make me."

Shiro growled playfully as he stalked forward, already planning how he was going to take Lance down.  No way was he going to let that smug grin go without answering. Never mind everything else — Shiro could take him.

But as Lance started to weave around again, a hand shot out and grabbed him by the back of the uniform.  Allura hefted him up without even seeming to struggle and raised a brow. "I believe this is yours, Shiro."

"No fair!"  Lance called, though there was no heat to his voice.  "Hunk! Save me!"

"Busy," Hunk called, not even looking over.  He had gotten another blanket by now and was holding it up, seeing how high it would go.

"Betrayed!"

Shiro gave a wolfish grin, the grabbed Lance by the waist and yanked.  Allura let go immediately, her smile smug. The expression faded into concern as Shiro immediately tottered and collapsed backwards at the sudden weight, taking Lance down with him.  The entire mass of a full grown man landed right on top of Shiro's chest, properly winding him. When he tried to talk, all that came out was a reedy, breathless wheeze.

Scrambling off, Lance looked him over, hands hovering just over Shiro's chest.  "Oh, shoot. You alright, kiddo? Can you breathe?"

Shiro let out another wheeze, this one plaintive.

Lance winced and finally put his hands down.  "Uh oh. Seriously, you okay? I'm going to feel awful if I squished you while you were little."

Taking a deep breath, Shiro held it, testing his chest.

Then he launched himself off, wrapping his arms around Lance's neck and whipping around onto his back with one sinuous movement.  "Aha!"

Lance rocked forward at the sudden weight, but caught himself and snagged Shiro's ankles.  "You little sneak!"

Well, it had actually hurt, but Lance didn't need to know that.  So instead Shiro just threw himself to the side, trying to knock Lance down to the floor.

Which worked.  Except Lance fell backward as well as sideways, landing right back on top of Shiro.  This time, he arched his shoulders back, pinning Shiro down onto the rug with the force of him.  "Oh no!" Lance declared dramatically. "You got me! I'm definitely pinned down. Did you change gravity again?  I’m so heavy!"

"Lance!"  Shiro squirmed and kicked, jamming his boot against Lance's side.  But other than a grunt, his efforts came to nothing.

Which was when the door opened again.  Three more plates bobbed their way over to Hunk, and Pidge carefully stepped in after them.  Her arms were filled with colorful boxes. "If you were just going to flatten Shiro, you could have saved me the trip."

Keith snorted and sat down at the couch, now comfortably against the wall.  "He's not flattened yet, but you may want to hurry up and distract them."

Leaning down, Allura plucked Lance off of Shiro and set him down on his feet, idly tugging his uniform back into place.  Lance let her do so with only a small, amused smile. Then she carefully heaved up Shiro and set him down like he was made of glass.  At first, Shiro puffed up, prepared to be offended at the care. But then he remembered how easily she'd held Lance up and figured she had good reason to hold back.

"Alright, well, let's decide what we want to play," Pidge said, wiggling her stack of boxes.  There was a series of clings as the many different pieces in each box knocked together. "Then we can get the fort set up and get comfortable."

Shiro wandered over and took the top few boxes, looking them over.  One was a chessboard, which he obviously knew. Another was totally unknown to him, something about wonders.  The last he recognized, but had never played — Clue.

Pidge put down a couple more and looked over the battered box.  "That one? I haven't played it in forever, but it's pretty good.  I think everyone can play for that one, too."

Running a hand over the well loved cover, Shiro nodded.  "Yeah. Let's start with this one."

"Hunk?" Keith called.  "You had a plan?"

"Yeah."  Hunk picked up the roll of tape and ripped off a piece with his teeth.  "We're going to use the floating plates like support columns that we can walk under.  We can tape a corner to each disc, then use another blanket on top as the cover."

Shiro's eyes went wide.  "Cool." He carefully put down the box on the kitchen counter, then started to herd the floating plates over to Hunk.  They followed the movement of his hand immediately, responding to Atlas' control, and thus Shiro's intent. Taking a piece of tape from Hunk, he did his best to follow the directions.  He held the blanket up so it made a diamond shape, then taped that top corner to the disc closest to him. The process was repeated on the other plates, and they were spread out so that another blanket could just barely drape over the top, secured in place with a little more tape. Each edge of the four side blankets were taped together too, just at the top, so they spread out enough to fully enclose the space.

Then, once they were all out of the way, the whole thing lifted up at a thought, like a tent rising out of the ground.  Soon, there was a little room inside the living room, made of soft blankets and filled with pillows.

"Way to go, Hunk," Pidge said, grinning.  "Good plan."

"I've made a fort or two in my time."  Hunk buffed his fingers against the front of his uniform, openly pleased his himself.

Shiro turned and threw his arms around Hunk's chest, squeezing enthusiastically.  "Thank you, Hunk!" With that, he turned and dove into the tent, sliding through the natural door made by the overlap in the falling blankets.  He landed on a mound of pillows and rolled into them, giggling.

It was easily the biggest fort that Shiro had ever been in.  The support of the discs meant that they could take up nearly the entire room with it, and the new ceiling hung a solid five feet off the ground.  Shiro could stand at his full height, and he'd have to reach his arms all the way up to touch it.

"Thank you too, Atlas," he murmured, barely more than a whisper.  After all, she was the one who was doing the work holding this all up.

There were no words, but fondness and warmth wafted over Shiro like another blanket.

As the adults started to squeeze their way in, the previously giant space felt much more cramped.  All of them were able to fit, but it was a near thing.

"We could use a second blanket on top," Pidge offered, looking up. "Tape them both together then spread it out more."

Keith shifted, scooting closer to Shiro so they could still have space in the middle for the board.  "No, this is fine."

Shiro beamed and held a pillow to his chest, hugging in.  There wasn't a lot of space, but that was because it was full of people who cared about Shiro and wanted to play with him now, as he was.  "Yeah, this is perfect. Now how do we play?"

***

It turned out that Clue didn't take very long to beat. 

It also turned out that Shiro's fellow paladins were just as competitive as he was.  After being utterly destroyed by Pidge in the first game, everyone quickly figured out that the key to the game was to obfuscate or hide your own personal knowledge, while trying to mine the others' questions for what they knew.  

By round two, Shiro had mostly wrapped his head around the best way to play.  By round three, he was determined to win this round and wipe the smirk off of Allura's face.

Which was, of course, when the door opened.

"—pairs should be completed by next week," Iverson said.  "If not sooner. We get that alien expert for the engine room on Monday, so things might go faster by then."

"Slav?" Sam replied.  "Could go either way. Either he'll have them fixed up in moments, or he'll make us completely start over everything from scratch, and it won't matter anymore."  There was a pause, and then he cleared his throat. "I see you found a way to entertain yourselves."

Shiro put down his clue sheet and grabbed his pillow instead, deflating on himself.  It had seemed so reasonable and easy when everyone else had started talking about having fun.  But with Sam back, Shiro suddenly felt like he was trying to get out of his punishment.

The other five watched Shiro sink into himself, then shared a determined look.  It was Pidge who stuck her head out of the fort, closing it around her neck as if the seal it off from the rest of the world.  "The rest of us were bored," she said plainly. "So we figured this was a good way to pass the time, that's all."

"Officers of the IGF were bored and built a blanket fort," Iverson repeated back, his voice suddenly deeper and harsher.

Inside the fort, Hunk winced.  "Ah jeez."

"He's not our drill instructor anymore," Lance breathed, though he sounded half like he was saying it for his own benefit.  "What's he going to do about it?"

"I heard that, Cadets."

Both of them jolted before they could stop themselves.

Keith, on the other hand, just crossed his arms and rolled his eyes.  "We're not cadets anymore."

"Are you sure?" Sam asked flatly.

Shiro took a deep breath, then gathered himself up and stood.  He gently tugged the blanket out of Pidge's hand, careful not to pull hard enough to bring it all down on their heads, then stepped out to face them both.  Iverson and Sam both stood in the kitchen, though Atlas had thankfully closed the door behind them so no one could hear Shiro get scolded (again). Sam had his arms tightly crossed and his brow raised over the top of his glasses, while Iverson's hands were folded behind his back.

Both of their stern gazes burned into Shiro.

Straightening up, Shiro met their eyes, no matter how his own stomach flipped.  "They wanted to do something fun today, since Atlas can make me older again tomorrow afternoon.  If I'm going to be punished, we should go to another room. There are plenty that still don't belong to anybody, and there's no reason to take down the fort or their games just because I'm in trouble.  They didn't do anything wrong and they deserve to have fun." He held his chin up, prepared to face whatever was coming to him, so long as his friends weren't punished too.

There was a long pause.

Then Iverson dropped his face into his hand and groaned.  "That's not fair."

"Mitch!"  Sam turned on Iverson, sounding scandalized.  "You were supposed to help me!"

"I'm used to yelling at smug teenagers.  Not... that!" Iverson gestured vaguely at where Shiro stood.  "I can do a lot, but you're asking me to kick a puppy."

Shiro opened his mouth to argue he was, in fact, nearly a teenager.  But sense caught up at the last second, saving him.

Groaning, Sam shook his head.  "Useless. You've mellowed."

"There was an alien invasion.  I think I'm allowed."

With a last sigh, Sam turned and put his hands on his hips.  His expression sobered, and some of the tension from before shot up Shiro's spine.  "You were supposed to be grounded."

Shiro nodded, head dropping back down. "I know.  But you talked about apologizing to everyone, and that sounded like the right thing to do.  But then you were gone for hours and I thought people were probably leaving the infirmary already, and I wanted to apologize and make things right now, instead of them still being mad when I'm old again.  So I went to do that, and I have a list of things I was going to do to make it better. Some of them need to be older me, but some of them I can do tomorrow. Then I was tired and my head hurt, so I just walked and I ended up with the Black Lion on accident and they said it was okay to talk."

In the back of his head, there was an unhappy grumble, but at least Atlas wasn't outright objecting anymore.

At first, Sam tilted his head, seeming to process all of that.  His eyes roamed over Shiro's face, then darted past him, probably getting confirmation from his daughter.  Finally he sighed. "Alright. It's your last evening, I'm not going to keep you grounded for the whole time."

Shiro nearly slumped to his butt with relief.  "Thank you. And I'm really, really sorry. I didn't mean to hurt anyone."

"I know you didn't."  Sam finally stepped forward and rested a gentle hand on top of Shiro's head, ruffling the hair.  When Shiro didn’t knock him away, Sam bundled him up into a proper hug, which Shiro returned immediately.  Embarrassingly, his eyes prickled, and a huge weight fell off of him. After that blowout, Sam's approval and forgiveness meant so much.

Iverson peered at the fort.  "What are you all even doing in there?"

"The Clue game," Allura replied, downright prim.  "And I am winning again."

"I'm not," Keith declared, uncharacteristically flip.  Then he whistled.

There was a flash of blue from inside the fort, then a bark.  Shiro's gasp of surprised delight was drowned out by four different upset cries.  A bright blue wolf bounded out over Pidge's head, scrambling for freedom from the blanket prison.  The force of that was enough to tear the tape free, and the blankets started to fall down from their respective discs.

"My fort!"

"You're cleaning up all those pieces, Keith."

"Okay, you can never call me a bad sport again."

"I was  _ winning!" _

Shiro bent down to scratch the strange wolf's ruff, who seemed perfectly content now that he wasn't in the blanket environment.  If Shiro didn't know better, he'd say that canine smile proved the wolf had done all that on purpose. Then he looked up at Iverson.  "There's chess too. Want to play?" Like most of his strange knowledge, that just felt right. A fact.

Iverson paused, and then gave a warm, fond smile.  "Yeah, I'd like that. Winner plays Holt, how's that?"

Shiro grinned back, his own smile competitive and toothy.  "You're on."

***

The chaos continued well into the evening. In that time, the tent was put back up, only to be destroyed again by Shiro launching into another wrestling match with Lance. He tried the same with Pidge and found that she played far too dirty, and then with Keith, who pinned him in seconds.

Shiro also ended up losing his chess game to Iverson, though he maintained it was narrowly. The match between Sam and Iverson after was far more energetic, since both sides felt comfortable trash talking. Iverson won that one as well, and was openly smug about it while Pidge chewed her father out for the loss.

Eventually, the officers made their excuses and left the paladins to their evening. They ended up playing the wonder game, as well as something about building up towns. By the end of all of that, Shiro was desperately flagging. The morning spent with the MFE felt like a hundred years ago, not a little over twelve hours. As much as he wanted to keep playing and bask in the attention, he was quickly running out of steam.

As Pidge set up the board for another round, Allura shook her head. "No, I think I need a break. I've learned the rules of too many games today, I believe. Would anyone mind if I put one of your shows on a screen?"

"Sure, go for it." Hunk dug out his tablet and handed it to her. "The program should be up still. I was watching some old documentaries on Earth's wildlife you might find interesting."

Allura's eyes brightened. "Oh, yes. That would be lovely." She looked down at Shiro, whose head kept sagging down. "I could use someone to help explain terms that do not translate. Shiro, would you like to sit with me?"

The excuse to step away from the games without losing face was too good to pass up. Shiro nodded, then yawned. He caught himself halfway through the movement, but he couldn't stop it by then. "Okay, yeah, if you want." He pushed himself up to his feet, wobbling on the blanket-covered rug, but he kept his balance. He let Allura guide him to the coach without a fuss, and smiled as Kosmo immediately bounded up to rest his head on Shiro's lap.

As the other four settled in for a new round, Allura tapped on the tablet. A screen appeared near the far wall. It was a little far away, since the couch was supposed to be closer to the center of the room, but it was occupied by four bickering paladins. Where they were was fine.

The program began, showing sweeping views of Earth biomes. Despite her earlier enthusiasm, though, Allura only occasionally watched the screen. The rest of the time, her eyes drifted down to look at Shiro instead.

Stifling another yawn, Shiro looked up at her. "Is something wrong?"

"No, not wrong." Allura let her hand rest on Shiro's shoulder, curling her legs under her. Kosmo's ears perked as she moved, keeping careful track of what she was up to, but then he went back to nosing Shiro's closest hand for more petting. "May I ask you a question, though?"

Shiro nodded, slumping to the side so his head rested on her arm. She stiffened, but then relaxed with a smile. "Sure. I might not remember the answer, though." He ran his fingers between Kosmo's ears, smiling at the closed-eyes bliss it produced.

"I understand. This is about something you said yesterday." She paused like she was considering her words carefully. If he had more energy, Shiro would have been impatient, but right now he was content just to be sitting somewhere warm and comfortable. "You wanted us to verify our friendship with you, but only Keith could."

Shiro glanced up at her. "Well, yeah. 'Cause I couldn't remember the other stuff. I know you're my friends now." He bit the inside of his cheek. "You miss him."

"Ah. We-" She took a deep breath, then let it go slowly. "It's a strange situation. You have been wonderful to spend time with as you are. But your older self remembers the history we share. It's difficult to lose that context. Not your fault at all, of course."

"Atlas' fault."

_ I would not say fault,  _ Atlas said.  _ Design, perhaps. _

Same thing. Despite his teasing, Shiro smiled and felt Atlas' warmth in response.

Allura chuckled. "I wouldn't say that either, mostly because I don't think it wise to annoy the ship I live in." That was probably wise. Shiro grinned and nodded into her arm.

Speaking of.

"You made my arm, right? You said that." Shiro held up the right limb, working the metal fingers. "You couldn't prove it then. Atlas would have told me if it was a lie, but I didn't know that then. I do now. You did it."

"I did."

Shiro closed the fingers again, then looked up at her. "Thank you. It's really cool, and it doesn't mess up sometimes."

Allura went still, and then her fingers tightened around Shiro's shoulder. "I'm glad to hear that, and I'm glad you like it. I admit, you were already missing the arm when I made this one." Her eyes roamed over Shiro, no longer even pretending to watch the show. "It feels comfortable?"

"Better than the regular one." Maybe not for most people, and Shiro would have been far more annoyed if it was his left hand. But the right one was the one that sometimes went wrong, and the metal one felt good. Normal in a way Shiro had never felt. All of him was that way, actually, even though he hadn't done his exercises that day and he'd been so active.

"Good," Allura breathed vehemently. "I wasn't aware it was so difficult for you. Not until..." She trailed off and shook her head. "I should save this conversation for later."

Probably. Older Shiro would have a better reason for why he didn't tell people. But as he was now, he could guess. So he rested his free hand over Allura's and looked up at her. 

"I don't tell people about what the doctors said,” Shiro admitted. “Not since I came to my new school. Before, I got teased, sometimes, because I would mess up or be clumsy. Then, when I told the other kids, they wouldn't believe me, or they'd treat me like I was contagious or too sick to do anything. So when I came here, and I had my cuffs and my exercises, I didn't tell anybody. It's been better. Maybe that's why he didn't either."

Allura's eyes went wide, and then she pulled Shiro in closer, practically crushing them together. "Oh, Shiro."

"I'm okay, though! You said I'm okay. I'm better, the doctor said, and it's fine if you guys know. You don't treat me like that." Even so, Shiro let go of Kosmo to wrap both hands around her chest.

"I never would. You're one of the strongest people I know. At any age." Allura held on tightly, just shy of bruising strength. "You made an excellent point, though. I know so little about how you grew up."

Well, most of it was boring, to be fair. Shiro couldn't imagine just talking about it out of nowhere, especially if he wasn't going to introduce his friends to his grandfather. But an idea struck, so Shiro scrambled out of her grip to the bookshelf. Plucking out the right novel, he came back and cracked it open to the inscription. "Grandfather gave this to me." He held it up so she could read, since it wasn't anything embarrassing. "They're my favorite. I could read some of it to you, if you want."

"I would like that very much."

Matching her wobbly smile, Shiro pressed against her side and started to read. The other four had to be able to hear it, but none of them made a show out of listening, so Shiro could pretend they couldn't. Occasionally he stumbled over a word's pronunciation, because these books were in English rather than the Japanese translations he’d originally read.  Gut Allura never commented, and no one said anything, so Shiro could press on without worry.

Eventually, the words started to blur and double up. Shiro's voice slurred as Calum decided to make an emergency landing on the mood. As he slumped further, the book was gently pulled from his fingers. But the presence under his head stayed warm and friendly, so he didn't mind.

Shiro drifted off, utterly spent but smiling.

***

"Everything seems normal, Captain." Doctor Fraiser said.

Shiro dropped his arms and rolled his shoulders. "Glad to hear it. I'm cleared for work, then?"

Fraiser, now only up to Shiro's shoulders even when standing, arched a brow at him. "I think not, I'm afraid. We have no idea the kind of effects the rapid changes can have on the human body. You'll be taking it easy for at least the rest of the day, if not tomorrow as well."

Straightening up, Shiro frowned down at her. "That's not necessary. If there were side effects, I'm sure Atlas would have said."

_ I cannot be sure of the effects, _ Atlas immediately chimed it.  _ It is important to listen to the doctor. They are the expert on human physiology. _

The little opportunist. Shiro hadn't forgotten at all what he'd learned as a child. He and Atlas were going to have a long, long talk about taking extreme actions without permission.

The presence backed away, sulking and only slightly apologetic, even now.

Fraiser pressed her clipboard to her chest and huffed at him. "We'll see how you feel tomorrow morning. For now, I have to insist on today."

That was another full day lost to this nonsense, then. Shiro bit back a sigh, frustrated. Especially since, while younger, he'd caused untold chaos and damage. Shiro still had no idea the full extent of what the gravity had done, and now he was going to have to wait till tomorrow. He'd try to go over the doctor's head, but Fraiser had begun reporting her orders to Sam and Mitch. It cut him off at the knees.

"Alright," Shiro said, with as much grace as he could manage. "But I'm free to go for now?"

Waving him off, Fraiser nodded. "Yes. But if I find out you so much as filed a report this afternoon, we'll be having words."

Who exactly was Captain, here?

Still, Shiro nodded. If it came down to it, he wasn't sure he'd win that contest of wills. It was best to opt it and save his dignity.

With that, Fraiser waved him out, and Shiro made his escape.

Only to freeze when he realized the hallway was full of people.

"All good?" Pidge asked casually, leaning against the wall. The rest of the paladins, as well as Sam and Coran, were crowded around her in the narrow space.

Shiro's brows rose. "Yes, I'm all clear, though I have another check tomorrow." At this point, he'd have spent more time in the infirmary rather than at his desk over the past few days. What a bother.

Speaking of—

"I'd like to apologize," he said, straightening. "I'm sure it wasn't your plan to have to put everything down and take care of a ten year old. Thank you all for being so patient with me while—"

Lance scoffed loudly. "Oh, please, Shiro. Are you serious?"

Pausing, Shiro blinked at him. "Yes?"

"You were no trouble at all," Allura assured fiercely, as if protective of Shiro's younger self.

"I think there's a very strong argument against that, actually."

Keith shook his head and crossed his arms. "You were fine, and anyone who says otherwise can talk to me about it."

Nodding as well, Hunk gave a little smile. "After all the times you kept an eye on us while we got into trouble, it was about time we returned the favor."

"I've certainly seen far worse. In fact, when the Princess was around the same age—"

"I'm sure no one needs to hear that story, Coran."

Shiro looked over everyone, and then his eyes locked onto Sam.

Shaking his head, Sam sighed. "You have your list. The fact that your ten year old self kept careful track of how to make up for his mistakes says a lot about you as a person." He gave Shiro a gentle smile. "It was nice to get to take care of you for once. You so rarely let us do it."

The words cut deeper than Shiro expected. He clenched his right hand by his side, which only reminded him of the conversation with Allura last night. His eyes tracked up to her, aware of the knowledge she now held.

But she still looked proud, in a strange way. Like his younger self had managed to impress her.

In a way, he'd been braver then than he was now.

_ They are you friends, _ Atlas said, gentle now.  _ Your family. They wish to support you, and you deserve it. You should let them, Captain. _

Looking over the group, Shiro couldn't deny a word.

"Alright," he allowed, smiling as well. "Thank you."

"Nah," Pidge said, waving him off. "We just returned the favor. Thank you, Shiro."

She meant it.

They all did.

Somewhere along the line, Shiro had forgotten how to let people in. This had stripped away those walls, at least in part, and they were all still here.

Shiro could trust them.

In the back of his head, Atlas practically radiated smug pleasure. Worse, Shiro couldn't even protest.

"If you are free for the afternoon, I wouldn't mind hearing the rest of that story," Allura offered, stepping forward.

The adventures of a young boy in a kiddie-fied version of the universe couldn't be that interesting to Allura. But she seemed completely sincere as she waited, head tilted. The rest of the group did too, though Sam's brows rose in question.

Shiro only hesitated for a moment. "Yes, let's finish it."

He let himself be tugged into the group, jostled in them and surrounded by people in a way he almost never allowed himself.

There was so much to do and so much mess to clean up.

Despite that, Shiro relaxed, maybe for the first time in years.

He was loved. He was supported. His ten year old self had figured that out, so it was time his twenty-six year old self did as well.

With that in mind, Shiro smiled and let himself be lead.


End file.
